Digital Deconstruction
by ultlifeform
Summary: The Chronicle of 4 teenagers Ryan Goodspeed, Kali Bicak, Hank "Tank" Felix, and Lily Hope and their adventures in the Digital world with their digital companions. After many delays, Chapter 9 up! R&R please
1. Chapter 1: Running Head Start

Disclaimer thingy:

I do not own Digimon

I think Bandai does... or Toei... or somebody... but not me

Some of the Digimon in this story are made up by me... all other Digimon are owned by the above noted company or companies

All of the humans in this story are made up by me... although some humans mentioned in this story are owned by the above

Having said all that and thinking of nothing else to say... I leave you to the story

enjoy

_Chapter 1_

_Running Head Start_

"Go… FASTER!"

"What are you complaining about now?"

"Sorry Tank, just trying to beat this game," I replied. I need to remember that he actually sleeps at night.

I paused the game and set the controller down. "Time for a break," I muttered to myself. I jumped up and went into the kitchen. The dishes still needed to be done. It was my turn, but I didn't feel like doing them just yet. I looked in the fridge and sighed. "Lots of food, but nothing to eat." I shut the fridge and walked to Tank's door. "I'm going to go get some food on campus," I called through the closed door.

"Are you taking the car?"

"What the heck for?"

"Because it's two in the morning, it's about forty degrees outside, and campus is five…" he paused briefly. "Never mind, go freeze your ass off. But I'm not nursing a sick nineteen year old when you get back."

"I can't get sick," I called back jokingly, "I'm still a teenager. I'm invincible."

I grabbed my jacket off the wall, stepped through the door, and started walking down the stairs. I jogged over to the mailbox. "Let's see… anything for Ryan Goodspeed? Bill, bill, bill, credit card offer, bill, bill… sheesh, thirteen bills, two credit card offers, and a letter to Tank from his parents. Guess that's what happens when no one checks the mail for a week." I stuffed the envelopes in my jacket pocket and started to jog toward campus. "Five miles, at a decent pace, should be about half an hour."

Running has always helped me organize my thoughts. And I had a lot to think about. My grades were slipping. My family was getting ready to move several states away. I needed a job in the next couple of months, or I was going to run out of money. I had a new girlfriend, and although that helps relieve some stress, you also add another person's stresses to your own. And Kali had a lot of stresses. But, no matter what happens, you just have to keep going. That was all I could do. Just keep running and try to keep up the best I could. No one knows what the future will hold. "I just… I just wish there was something more. It feels like there has to be more than just this. Something I'm missing, something I'm not seeing even though it's right under my nose. But what?" I closed my eyes and enjoyed the feeling of the wind running through my hair. It was cold, but it was soothing. I ran for about thirty seconds with my eyes closed, just enjoying the breeze. Then, when I opened them back up, something caught my attention.

I slowed down to a walk. "Where am I? I didn't think there was anyplace like this anywhere near campus." I looked around, but all I could see were trees in every direction. I had made this jog many times before, and I was certain there was no forest in the middle of downtown. The forest was dense, too, and the trees stretched at least fifty feet into the air. The tops of the trees formed a thick canopy that the moonlight could barely pierce. "Are those… palm trees?" Palm trees do not grow in northern Indiana. They just don't, period. Something weird was going on.

I kept walking in the same direction I had been. In theory, I'll eventually come out of the forest or find a stream to follow or something. I wasn't paying attention when I got here, as I could tell from the fact that last I checked I was running on a sidewalk next to a street. I turned and looked behind me, but saw only trees. No sign of street, sidewalk, or even buildings. Turning back now would only make me second-guess myself and cause me to end up even more lost. I simply needed to press forward.

After about five minutes, I started to get worried. By ten minutes, I was turning into a nervous wreck. I started calling out to see if anyone was around. "Hello! Is anybody here? I'm kinda lost! Hello?" I continued walking for about twenty more minutes, until finally, I saw a break in the trees.

I could feel the hope returning and I started running forward towards the edge of the forest. I emerged from the trees and looked around. A huge plain stretched from the forest to as far as I could see. There were miles of nothing but grass and flowers. "Ummm… Toto, I don't think were in Indiana anymore." Suddenly a loud crashing noise came from behind me. I swung around and saw one of the trees about fifty feet from the edge of the forest fall to the ground. Then another crash, followed by a closer tree falling down. "That… cannot be good." Then something burst from the edge of the forest. A large creature on four legs with a giant horn on its head charging strait for me. "What the hell?" I turned and started running as fast as I could. In the dark I couldn't tell if it was a rhino, a dinosaur, or something else, and honestly, I didn't care. It was coming right at me and was not showing any signs of slowing down. I made a sharp right turn to try and lose it, but it turned and continued following me. I was starting to panic. I knew I couldn't outrun this thing form much longer. I was getting tired and running out of breath. I turned my head back to look. I was starting to lose my ground.

My foot hit something hard, and I tripped flying face first into the ground. "Ouch…" I pushed off the ground with my hands and shook my head. Then remembered the creature that was chasing me. I flipped around, sure that I would be trampled at any second, but it was just standing there. No, something was blocking it. My vision slowly cleared from hitting the ground. Standing just between me and the giant rhino dinosaur thing, was another creature. It looked like a small velociraptor, maybe four feet tall. But the head was different. It looked more like the head of a python, and it was wearing goggles over its eyes. Its long tail ended in large blade. It was crouched down on one knee with its tail swept up over its body. The large blade at the end pushed up against the huge horn of the other beast. Despite being only a fraction of its size, he was holding the other creature at bay with nothing but his tail. The smaller creature turned its head toward me and then it spoke.

"Hey, you know if you go ahead and get out of the way, I could let this guy go and we wouldn't both get trampled."

I sat there for a second, shocked; this creature just spoke to me. I shook my head, jumped to my feet, and dashed of to the left. As soon as I was clear, the small reptile dipped his tail toward the ground and jumped backwards in one fluid motion. The giant beast rammed his snout into the ground and skidded to a halt ten feet away, its nose carving a large trench the entire way. "What the hell is that thing?" I asked staring at it.

The smaller creature, which now stood beside me, answered, "That's a Monochromon."

I was again surprised to hear it talk. I wasn't actually expecting an answer. I stayed focused on the large beast. "A what?"

"A Monochromon."

I turned and looked at him. "For that matter, what are you?"

"You can call me Jetomon."

"Are you… a Digimon?" I wasn't sure how I knew that word. I was certain I had never heard it before, but somehow, I just knew this thing and the larger one stuck in the ground were Digimon. Whatever a Digimon was.

"That's right. You must be a human. I've never seen a human before."

"Well then, I guess we're even, cause I've never seen a Digimon before. My name is Ryan."

"Well Ryan, I hope you're ready for round two."

"Huh?" I turned back toward the larger creature, the Monochromon. It had pulled its head from the ground and was shaking it to get all of the dirt off of it.

"So, what exactly did you do to make old gray scale so mad at you?" Jetomon asked.

"I didn't do anything, I was just walking out of the forest and he started charging me out of no where." The Monochromon turned its head from side to side, looking for something. It turned around and saw what it was looking for… me.

Jetomon continued talking, "That figures, there seems to be a bug going around recently. Don't know what's causing it, but Digimon all over have been getting violent for no reason. Well, gunna have to put him down. Those are the orders."

"Orders?" I asked. "You mean kill him?"

"Yup." The Monochromon charged at us again. I jumped to the left and spun around. Jetomon jumped to the right and slashed at its side with his tail, and then shouted, "Sonic Boom!" A large wave of sound distorted the air around him and flew at the Monochromon, hitting him in the back. As I ran back toward Jetomon, the Monochromon slowed to a stop. There was a large gash in the side of the creature where Jetomon had hit him with his tail. Bright lights swam from inside the injury. Jetomon ran forward at incredible speed, and jumped into the air. "Sonic Boom!" Another shockwave flew towards the Monochromon and hit right on the pre-existing cut. The armor skin around it began to crumble and Monochromon seemed to vibrate for a few seconds before letting out a loud painful roar. And then he just disintegrated. Thousands of specs of light dissipated every direction, and then a bright light emerged from the center of where it had stood. The light took the form of an egg, then the light faded, and the egg fell to the ground. I walked toward the egg slowly. It looked bright silver in the moonlight with large dark gray spots on it. It was the biggest egg I had ever seen in my life. "Is that… Monochromon?"

"Well, when a Digimon dies, it doesn't really die. Its data just gets reformatted and he returns to an egg form. Eventually the egg hatches and the Digimon gets to live on. What, it doesn't do that for humans?"

"No way!" I replied back quickly.

Jetomon looked up at the sky. "Well, the sun will be coming up in a few hours, you should probably get back to your home."

"Shouldn't we do something with this egg first?" I asked.

"Nah, Swanmon will show up in a few minutes to take the egg back to the nursery. They're keeping extra careful watch lately with this random bug going around. But humans don't hold a very high opinion around here. Some Digimon blame them for the problem. So you should probably get out of here."

"Well, the problem is, I don't know how to get home. I don't even know how I got here." I answered. "Heck I don't even know where here is."

Jetomon thought for a second. "Well I can tell you where you are. You're in the digital world. The Network continent, to be specific." He explained, although I had no idea what he was talking about. "As for how to get back, try to remember what you were doing when you ended up here."

I thought for a few seconds. "I was… thinking. About wanting to find something new."

Jetomon replied, "Well then, maybe thinking about wanting to go home will take you home."

It made a little sense, I guess. As much sense as a talking snake-dinosaur wearing goggles can make. I closed my eyes and concentrated. "Home… I want to go home." I pictured my warm comfy bed with my nice warm blankets and fluffy pillow. I opened my eyes. Jetomon stood in front of me still. I looked around. Nothing had changed. I was still sitting in a giant field with a huge forest off to my side.

"Ummm… it's not working."

"I can see that," replied Jetomon. "Was there anything else you were doing, besides just thinking?"

"Ummm…" I thought for several seconds. "Oh yeah! I was running, duh!"

Jetomon smiled, and I could see the two large snake fangs in his mouth. At least I think he was smiling. "Well then start running. I'll make it interesting. I'll race you. We'll see who's ahead until you get back to your world."

I smiled back, "Oh you are on. I'll have you know that I've never lost a race in my life." I crouched down and got set up for a sprint along the edge of the forest.

"Neither have I. Ready… Set… Go!"

I dashed forward as quickly as I could. But Jetomon shot forward like a gunshot. He had to be running at least fifty or sixty miles an hour. "Damn, I guess that's why they call him Jetomon." I concentrated on going home again as I ran. As I concentrated, the area around me warped. The trees faded away and were replaced by buildings. The grass beneath my feet melted away into cement sidewalk. After a few seconds, everything was back to the normal city, just a few blocks from my apartment.

Up ahead, about seventy feet away or so, stood Jetomon in the middle of the street. The moonlight reflected off his slick skin and goggles. "How did you get here?" I yelled out to him.

"I dunno!" he yelled back. "I guess I was thinking about home, too! But I don't have a home, so I guess I just ended up coming with you! But I can get back on my own!"

I could hear the sadness in his voice. I knew what it was like to feel like you had no home. My family moved a lot when I was a kid, and they were getting ready to move again. And for him to have just made a friend only to have him leave moments later. Well, he did save my life. I made up my mind.

"Hey!" I called back. "How about we race all the way home."

"You mean it?" He yelled in response.

"Heck yeah! Let's go home!"

"You're on!" He yelled, and with that he took off running again.

I ran forward to the next intersection and stopped. "Hey Jetomon!" He stopped running and looked back. "Home is this way!" I yelled and dashed down the other street. I only had two blocks to go, and all I had to do was make sure he didn't pass me on the way. I ran as fast as I could. One block left. I couldn't turn and see where he was as that would only slow me down. I had to put everything into this. There was the apartment. I dashed up the steps and put my hand on the door. Three seconds before Jetomon reached it.

I grinned at him. "I told you I've never lost a race."

"You just won because I didn't know where your home was. Next time, things will be different."

I patted him on the head. "Whatever you have to tell yourself." I knew he was probably right, but I didn't care. That was the most exhilarating race I had ever run in my life. It was amazing. My heart was practically beating out of my chest. I leaned against the door for a second to catch my breath.

"Alright," I said, regaining my composure. "My roommate lives in here. I don't want to have to try to explain you to him, and he's sleeping right now, so we need to be extra quiet. Understand?"

"Gotcha." Jetomon replied quietly.

"Alright, my door is the second door on the left. Let's go." I opened the door and walked towards my room. Jetomon followed me and after we both got inside, I quietly shut the door behind me.

"Alright Jetomon, I'm going to sleep. You can… sleep on the floor, I guess… I'll get you something more comfy later."

"Okay," he quietly replied.

I laid down in bed and got under the covers. "Wow… what an amazing day." I got chased by a giant rhino dinosaur called Monochromon, and made friends with a Digimon named Jetomon. I just knew I had finally found what I thought was missing from my life. Things were sure to be interesting from that point on. This was destined to be my greatest adventure ever. The adventure of Ryan Goodspeed.

"Oh, crap. I'm still hungry!"

Author's notes...

This chapter is written in a very fast style to reflect the character's personality

Subsequent chapters will be written from the viewpoints of different characters, each with his/her own style (4 in total)

There are 26 planned chapters for this story, so yes, it's going to be a long one

Drama, angst, and such are sure to come up at some point

Chapter 2 is due soon


	2. Chapter 2: A Cut Above

Disclaimer thingy: I don't own Digimon... some big company in Japan does. I also don't own Indiana... USA does.

Author note: This chapter contains a reference to a pre-existing digimon character, namely Koushiro, better known in America as Izzy. I doubt that any other pre-existing human characters will show up, but just to be safe, this is how I will determine names. Any pre-existing humans will be refered to by the name used in their place of origin. example: Kari would be labeled as Hikari, because she is from Japan. However Willis would still be labeled as Willis as opposed to his Japanese name, Wallace, because he is from America.

_Chapter 2_

_A Cut Above_

…

My name is Kali Micah Bicak. I am a nineteen-year-old female attending a local university in northern Indiana. I was born on a military outpost in Romania, but have lived most of my life in America. My father left us fifteen years ago. My mother…

I live in an apartment with my roommate, Nikki. I don't know her well, and we rarely speak to each other. She is out with friends a lot. She used to invite me to come with them, but I spend all of my time on my computer or reading books. The only time I leave my room is to go to class, the library, or to spend time with my boyfriend, Ryan Goodspeed. An obvious case of opposites attracting, Ryan couldn't be more different from me. Perhaps that is what makes me like him. He represents everything that I am not. He… he makes me smile. Few things in life accomplish that for me.

Sunday. Wake up at six in the morning, shower, brush teeth, comb hair, dress, eat breakfast. Computer research until noon, lunch with Ryan, then computer research until ten. Then sleep until morning. My favorite day of the week. I stepped out of the shower. The smell of coconut shampoo filled the room. I opened the door and walked to my closet. Underwear, bra, jeans, shirt, socks, shoes, gloves… time to go make breakfast. Two eggs, tomato, onion, mushroom, bell pepper, and cheese… an omelet is my preferred way to start the day. After eating and having a glass of milk to take my medication with, I returned to my room and booted my laptop up. There was nothing quite like the sound of my Apple powering on. I logged into my account.

"Kamui, run play list research. Open document quantum physics assignment fifteen."

The music began playing as my ten pages of assignment loaded. I started opening the books on my desk. I still had a week to get to twenty pages. Might as well do it now.

Eleven pages…

"No one knows what it's like to feel these feelings…"

Twelve pages…

"For this I gave up trying, one good time deserves my dying…"

Thirteen pages…

"Wish I may, wish I might, be someone else tonight…"

Fourteen pages…

"You say that all the good is gone, that I have forgotten who I am…"

There was a knocking at my door.

"Enter."

Nikki opened the door and looked at me. She was wearing her bright green winter coat and her pale brown boots. Her upper legs were still bare… I did not understand the concept behind this wardrobe choice. It looked like most of her body would be overheated, while her legs froze. I suppose I just don't understand "style" like she does. Or at least that's what she keeps telling me.

"I'm going to go get some lunch with George, Paul, and John. Ummm… would you like to come along?"

Her usual gleeful attitude was offset by a bit of nervousness. She either didn't want me to come with her, but felt obliged to ask, or she was simply nervous asking me because I made her uneasy. Or maybe it was the less than cheery music selection. I didn't have any of the pop music that she always blared until I got home, at which time she would turn it down or off, probably out of fear. Although of what, I don't know.

"Is Ringo coming, too?" I asked as calmly as possible.

"Who?" she replied with a confused look on her face. Cute… not the brightest bulb in the apartment, but cute nonetheless.

"Never mind. Kamui, time." The clock displayed across the screen. Eleven sixteen, she was leaving early today. "No thank you, I have a date with Ryan at one, and I want to get a couple more pages done before I go. Maybe some other day," I lied. I never really intended to go on one of her excursions with whatever random guys were the flavor of the week. What the hell was I going to do, discuss political theory with a cheerleader and three members of the football team? I think not.

"Oh… well I guess I'll talk to you tonight then…"

I could here the dejection in her voice. I pondered for a moment on whether it was sincere or not, but decided to just ignore it. "Alright," I replied as I turned back to my computer. I heard the door open, then close moments later. I had the apartment to myself again. I returned to my studies. I had to go meet with Ryan soon.

Something was off. I couldn't focus on my work. I had been having this problem for a couple of weeks now. I wasn't sure what was causing it. It was as if somebody from far away was calling my name. Or perhaps somebody close by, but from long ago. A voice that traveled through the years, only just now reaching me. A familiar voice, like that of a long lost friend. Or perhaps it was merely my imagination, or subconscious. Maybe it was my id trying to reappear and reconcile with my superego. Or perhaps it was nothing more than a lack of focus caused by stress. This was definitely something I needed to bring up with my therapist at our monthly meeting next week.

My eyelids felt heavy. I opened a few web pages unrelated to my research. My thoughts ran everywhere. I took a deep breath and stretched. A news article caught my eye, a new theory about the existence of parallel dimensions, written by a highly reputed scientist named Koushiro Izumi. Koushiro wrote very fascinating works. I clicked the link to view the published theorem. "Parallel Dimensions: More than what is Beyond the Mirror". As I read it, I was absorbed into it. Koushiro theorized that there were several parallel dimensions, from about a half dozen to an infinite amount, and that they weren't just near mirrors with the same people, but different actions. This would be nearly impossible, as different actions would change births and deaths of people. If two people had a child together in one, but didn't know each other in the other realm, that person would not exist in both. Rather, the parallel realms would be completely different, perhaps with life forms not even resembling humans. These alternate realms could be created from this one. Fueled with enough energy, a new dimension could be created from the communal emotions of humanity, or from the sheer volume of data present in the Internet and other forms of digital communication. He made it sound completely feasible, although he acknowledged the unlikelihood of dimensional travel. There was a soft knock at the door. Had she locked herself out? We never lock the door unless we're both out of the house. It was also still very early for her to be returning. Had the guys canceled on her? She knocked on the door again. "Be right there." I reached to unplug my laptop. I didn't dare take my eyes off of the article. I couldn't feel the power cord; it must have fallen out at some point. I picked up my laptop and took it with me to go open the door for her. "You should really keep your keys on you, what if I had left already?" I continued reading the web page as I walked toward the door and opened it. There was a strong breeze and I could feel snow blowing in through the doorway.

"Thanks, it's awful cold out there."

Her voice sounded odd, probably from the weather. I shut the door and walked back to my room, still not looking away from my computer for even a second. I sat down in my chair and continued reading. This was possibly the most amazing thing I had ever read. It was nothing short of amazing.

"What's that?"

I let out a loud sigh. "It's a scientific article that was just published." I looked off to the side, but Nikki wasn't there anymore. I returned to my computer.

"What's it about?"

I looked back to the side. Nothing. I saw something on the floor a couple feet away. A stuffed animal, looked somewhat like a hedgehog, but had no nose and large eyes. It was light purple with silver streaks coming running down its body. "Nikki, did you drop one of your stuffed animals in here?"

"Who's Nikki?"

The stuffed animal spoke. No, it must have been my imagination. "Nikki?"

"There's no one here but you and me."

It wasn't my imagination. It did speak. It wasn't a stuffed animal. "Am I… dreaming?"

"If you are, can you dream up a fire place? It's still really cold in here."

I started noticing other things. I wasn't in my room anymore… or if I was, all of my stuff was gone and the walls were really dusty. The only remaining furniture was the table and chair I was currently using. Both were very dusty. There were no windows, no lights, no power outlets, and although there was a doorway, there was no door to the room. The only door was the one in the other room that led outside. It was just a plain gray room. "Where am I?"

"You don't know? Isn't this your house?"

"No. Well… I don't think so."

"I never saw this house here before, but I sure was glad to see it. This blizzard came out of nowhere."

"Blizzard?" I began to notice the loud whistling of the wind blowing outside. It didn't sound good.

"Yeah, it's really bad out there, I thought my warranty had run out for sure. Would it be alright if I stayed here until the storm blew over?" It stared at me with its large eyes. It looked sad.

"Well, I can't very well force you out into that blizzard again, now can I?" Its eyes lit up and a huge grin appeared on its face.

"Oh, thank you thank you thank you thank you."

I was still somewhat certain that this was all just a weird dream, but figured I may as well go along with it for now. "Well, if we're going to be hiding out together, we may as well introduce ourselves. My name is Kali."

"Hello Kali, I'm Knifemon."

"Knifemon? As in knives?"

"That's me, sharp objects are my specialty."

"But I don't see a blade on your whole body."

"Well they're retractable, of course." Five blades came out from just behind its eyes, and one on each limb. "I can shoot them out, too." It closed its eyes and began puffing up.

"No wait! Not in here!"

"Kunai Storm!" It shouted as nine blades shot out from its body in various directions. The knives immediately began bouncing around the walls. I grabbed my laptop and dashed under the table, but something stung my left arm on the way. Safe under the table, I looked around the room. One kunai was stuck in the top of the table, its tip protruding about an inch through it. The other eight were scattered around the room. The closest one was stuck in the floor about a foot away. There was blood on it. I looked at my arm where I had felt the sting. A large gash ran across between my shoulder and elbow. Blood was seeping out of it.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. It was an accident. P-Please don't kick me out." It looked like it was about to cry.

"It… It's all right. Just don't do that inside." This was obviously not a dream. This hurt a lot, and no matter how firmly I held it, the bleeding wouldn't stop. I climbed out from under the table and set my laptop back down next to the knife sticking out. "Ummm… I need something to tie around this." I tried to rip some cloth off of my shirt, but with my injured arm, I wasn't strong enough.

"Oh, take that off, I'll cut it for you." Knifemon had seen me struggling with the fabric.

"Ummm… okay, just… don't shoot out those blades again."

"I won't."

I pulled my shirt off, being careful to avoid further injury to my arm. "Here you go," I said, setting the shirt on the floor in front of Knifemon. I continued applying pressure on the cut with my other hand. Without a shirt on, I could feel how cold it really was in here. Or perhaps I was cold from losing blood. There was a good-sized puddle on the floor, and it was growing.

Knifemon used her tiny legs to lay the shirt out neatly, and then the blade on her left leg emerged slightly. Dragging her leg across the bottom of the shirt, she cut a long strip off the bottom, retracted the blade, and stepped back

"There you go."

I reached down with my right arm and took the strip of fabric. "Thanks." With my teeth and my right hand, I looped the fabric around a couple times and tied it tightly. "That should hold for a while, at least until I can find a more permanent solution.

"See, aren't I nice to have around?"

"Don't press your luck, I wouldn't have needed it if you hadn't cut my arm."

"I… I'm sorry." Knifemon stared at the floor. "Can… we still be friends?"

I carefully put what was left of my shirt back on. My stomach was exposed now. "What do you mean still, we weren't friends to begin with. I just met you. But if it means that much to you, I suppose you did make up for it. I suppose we can be friends." I can't believe I just told a foot long bladed Easter egg that we were friends. What is wrong with me?

"Really! You mean it?"

I let out a sigh. "Accidents happen. I guess I can forgive you for this one. Just, try to keep the accidents to a minimum, at least the painful ones, anyway." I felt like I was talking to a child.

"Alright!"

"Now all we need to do is get out of here. It sounds like the wind has finally died down." In fact, I couldn't hear anything outside at all.

"Hey, you're right. Let's go check it out."

"Let me grab my computer first." I reached over and picked up my laptop, but something on the screen caught my eye. "Hey, I still have full battery… and my wireless signal is better than I've ever seen."

"Well ya, probably because you're in the digital world."

"The digital… world?" I closed the laptop and tucked it under my right arm. Could this be one of the parallel dimensions that Koushiro had suggested in his article? Had I somehow traveled to another realm of existence? That would explain the computer. In a digital world, I would be directly linked to the Internet, essentially part of the Internet. And the very environment would be sufficient to power my computer endlessly. But… how was I going to get home? I don't even know how I got here. According to Koushiro, this should be impossible.

I walked out of the room and over to the door of the building and opened it. Knifemon jumped back as a large pile of snow fell into the doorway. The snow outside appeared to be at least two feet deep. I stepped outside and looked around. There was nothing in every direction, as if somebody had drawn a little grey house in the center of a white paper and didn't bother with any background.

"WEEEEE!!!" Knifemon jumped out of the door and landed a foot past me instantly sinking in the snow. "mmmffffmmmmffffmmm…"

I sighed and reached out to pick her up out of the snow, but stopped.. "Hmmm…" My left arm was injured and I didn't think I would be able to carry Knifemon or my laptop with it. I tucked my laptop under my chin and held it to my chest as I carefully kneeled down and lifted Knifemon out of the snow with my right arm. I considered my options for a second before setting Knifemon on my head, and putting my laptop back in my right hand.

"You're going to have to stay up there, since you can't walk through the snow."

"Alright, thanks."

"Don't mention it, but pull my hair, and you'll be right back in the snow." I thought for a second about what I had just set on my head. "Cut my hair and I'll do worse than that. Much worse."

"O-Okay…"

I started walking, trying to keep my head balanced. I wasn't sure what direction to start walking; it was pretty much the same thing in every direction. Eventually the house disappeared from sight, and then it was just plain white in every direction.

"Hey Knifemon, you wouldn't happen to have any idea where we're going would you?

"Not a clue."

"Great, you're no help…"

I was starting to notice the cold more. My shirt left my midriff exposed and the shoes I was wearing were not meant for trotting through snowdrifts. Not to mention I wasn't wearing a jacket of any kind. My body was shivering and my teeth clattered together.

"Hey, I hear something," Knifemon called from on top of my head.

I clenched my teeth together to stop them from making noise and listened carefully. There was a voice off to the right. I couldn't make it out, but it was definitely something. "Finally," I said with relief and began running toward the voice. I had finally found someone else, and if that person couldn't tell me how to get home, then maybe they could point me to someone who could. The important thing was that I was going home. I had had enough of this place. As I got closer, the voice became clearer. Soon I was able to make out the words.

"… happened here? I know… Winter, but… ridiculous…"

"Man, I leave… digital world falls apart."

"It's not that bad."

There were two voices. As I got closer, a pair of silhouettes appeared in the distance. I ran as fast as I could. Well, as fast as I could in two feet of snow with a computer in one hand and a small animal on my head. One of the figures was hunched over. No, he wasn't hunched over. He had a long tail behind him, like a dinosaur. The other figure looked humanoid. Actually, as I got closer, the other figure began to look a lot like…

"RYAN!"

"What the hell?"

"RYAN!"

"Kali? KALI!"

Ryan saw me running toward him and began running in my direction. We finally reached each other, and I threw my arms around him and started crying.

"What the hell are you doing here, Kali? And what happened to your arm. And… and what the heck is on your head?"

"Oh, this is Knifemon. She's… well, I guess she's my friend. Wait, what are you doing here?"

"Huh? Oh, I thought you had canceled on our date, so I came here."

"What? You know how to get back home!"

"Aside from the stairs?" He was grinning, but it faded when he realized how upset I was. "Well, I just ran. All I have to do is run and think about going home. And when I want to come back, I just run and think about coming back here."

I looked down. "If that was all it took, I'd already be home by now."

"Ryan, maybe Kali needs a different way to get back."

"What the heck is this?" I asked looking at the giant lizard wearing goggles standing next to Ryan.

"Oh, this is my friend, Jetomon. Jetomon, this is my girlfriend, Kali."

"Wait, what does he mean, a different way?" I asked.

Jetomon scratched his head with a claw as he tried to explain it to me. "Well, Ryan runs between the two worlds. At first we thought it might have to do with speed. Maybe you had to be moving at a certain speed to transport between the two worlds."

"But when I got here, I was sitting in my apartment looking at my computer."

"Then maybe…" Ryan started thinking. "Oh, I don't know, this is very confusing."

Jetomon looked up at him. "Ryan, you seem to have a fascination with speed. You run fast, you talk fast, you seem to do everything as fast as you can."

"You got that right! Speed is my whole… existence… That's it! I use speed because that's who I am. I am speed. You were on your computer."

"My preoccupation is learning, so if I sit at my computer and wish to go home, I can go home?"

Knifemon spoke from on top of my head. "It sounds like it would work. You did guard that thing with your life."

"Yeah, from you."

"Do you want to go back home, Kali?" Ryan asked me.

"Well, since we did kind of miss our date, I suppose we can make it up now."

"Alright, what do you want to do?"

I looked around. Now that I wasn't fearing for my life, I noticed just how pretty the snow was. It was serene. "Why don't you show me around this… digital world?"

"Are you sure? You're arm is in pretty bad shape, from the look of it. We should probably get you to a hospital to get it taken care of."

I looked over at my arm. He was right, I at least needed to get it looked at. "Yeah, but… it's stopped bleeding. And I have a bandage over it, sort of. Can't we walk around for a little while first?" I batted my eyes at him and tried to be "cute".

Ryan stepped closer and lifted my arm, examining the injury. "Well… it does seem to be under control at the moment. Are you sure you want to risk it?"

"Yeah, it'll be fun. But I'm freezing, so I'm going back and getting my coat and boots. Here hold this." I leaned forward until Knifemon fell off. Ryan quickly reached out and caught her. I opened up my laptop and started clicking various links while I thought about returning to my apartment. "I'll be right back, so don't worry."

"We'll be waiting," Ryan replied.

The world began melting away and slowly shifted back into my apartment. When the area stopped shifting, I shut the laptop, walked into the living room, grabbed my trench coat off the hook, and replaced my shoes with thick fur lined boots. I grabbed my school bag, so that I would have something to put my computer in while we walked. It still had some books in it, but I didn't mind. I slung the bag over my right shoulder, threw my hat on, and opened my laptop back up. I gazed into the screen and thought about returning to the digital world. The area began warping again, and soon I found myself standing in the snow again, next to Ryan.

"Welcome back."

I stuffed my laptop into my school bag and reached my hand out. "I'll take that back now."

"Quit calling me 'that'," Knifemon said, glaring at me. Ryan laughed and handed her back to me.

"Are you ready to go?"

"I'm always ready. But we're leaving in fifteen minutes to take you to the hospital. C'mon Jetomon, let's go."

We started walking together, Knifemon on my right arm, Ryan to my left, and Jetomon on his left. Despite having a couple of extra guests, this was a really nice date. It was really beautiful with all of the snow. Sure beat dinner and a movie. The digital world had beauty and excitement and fun… We were certain to have multiple adventures visiting this place. A journey of epic proportions awaited us here. The journey of Kali Bicak.

"Hey Kali, you never told me what happened to your arm."

Knifemon and I smiled at each other. "It's a long story."

More author notes: This chapter was longer than chapter 1, about 25% longer, in fact.

The reference to Koushiro is used strictly to establish time frame. This story takes place several decades after season 2. None of the "Digi-Destined" will actually appear in this story.

Chapter 3 is already in the works... although I just started, so it will probably still take a few days or more.

It has been requested that I give a better description of Knifemon. Knifemon essentially looks like Tsukaimon, but paler, and no ear/wing things or tail. There are five silver stripes running from the back of her head down to the end of her body and one silver streak on each leg. The blades emerge from these silver streaks. The original idea comes from the Streaked Tenrec, a creature native to Madagascar. Shadow the Hedgehog is likely based on this creature as well (Tenrecidae means "fake hedgehog", and the Streaked Tenrec is black with five yellow/brown/red stripes coming off of it's head down it's body, a stripe on each leg, and a patch of white fur on its chest).

I also thought I would include the names of the songs that Kali sings while she is doing her homework. The first is "Behind Blue Eyes" by The Who. The second is "Bother" by Corey Taylor. The third is "Chosen One" by A2 (from the soundtrack for Shadow the Hedgehog). Finaly, the fourth is "Nobody Loves You" by Garbage.


	3. Chapter 3: Earning Your Stripes

Disclaiming stuff: I don't own this stuff... or that stuff... does anybody really own anything?

Shang Tsung: "Your soul is mine!"  
Oh hush you, that's cheating.

_Chapter 3_

_Earning Your Stripes_

"Hank, could I speak to you for a second?"

The other students filed out of the classroom one by one. I stopped and waited just left of the door. Once all of the students were out, Mrs. Simmons gathered the last few papers off of her desk and walked out to meet me. I already knew what this was about, but…

"What can I do for you, Mrs. Simmons?"

"I just wanted to tell you that I'm very proud of you. You did very well in debate class last year, and I'm looking forward to having you in class this semester, too."

Blah, blah, blah… she was avoiding the question. "Is that all?"

"No… you didn't join the debate team last semester, and I was kind of hoping to see you there this semester. I think you would enjoy it a lot, and I would be grateful to have you on board."

"Anything else?"

She looked off to the side. "No… that's all."

"I'll think about it. See you in class on Monday, Mrs. Simmons." I turned away and started heading back down the hallway. I had no intention of giving it any thought. She knew that as well, but I guess she wanted to give me the speech anyway. I didn't really feel like having some old lady tell me how to win my arguments. I was good at that already. The only reason I was even in the class was to get the credit. I needed this like I needed a hole in my head.

I turned left and headed out of the building toward the parking garage. It had been a long day, and I was looking forward to a very uneventful weekend. Away from school, away from teenage drama, away from teachers standing over you making sure you do it "their way". Just sitting in my apartment by myself.

Well, just Ryan and me anyway. Although, Ryan hadn't been home much in the last week. School just started, but school doesn't run until one thirty in the morning. I asked Kali a few days ago if he was spending more time with her, but she didn't know where he was either. I'll have to ask him what he's up to. Make sure he's not doing anything stupid or dangerous. But that means drama over the weekend… Well, maybe I'll bring it up at the end of the weekend, if I can find him.

I made my way up to the second floor of the parking garage. As I rounded the corner, I saw Ryan sitting on the trunk of my blue Pontiac Sunfire. This was the first day this week that he waited for me to give him a ride back home. I don't know how he was getting back the other days, the bus stops running at eight, so I knew he wasn't using that. As soon as he noticed me and I got into voice range, I shouted to him.

"Long time no see, where have you been all week?"

"All week? I haven't been gone that long, have I?"

"You've been 'magically' arriving home from school every day since classes started this Monday."

"Huh, I guess you're right." He had a huge smile on his face. I had to admit; I don't think I had seen him this happy since Kali agreed to date him. Which was partially why I was so worried.

"So what have you been up to?" I asked, as I reached the car and hopped in the driver's side. Ryan jumped off the trunk and climbed in the passenger's side. "And quit sitting on my trunk. I don't need any more dents than I already have."

"Oh, this and that, you know."

"No, I don't. That's why I asked."

"Relax Tank, you sound like my mother."

I smiled a bit. "Somebody's got to watch out for you. Otherwise, one of these days you'll run straight into a telephone pole."

"Hey, it was dark, and the light was burned out."

"Whatever… let's get the hell out of here."

"Sounds good. Motion to get food?"

"Motion seconded. Stake & Shake?"

Ryan nodded his head. I put the car in gear and we drove off. We spent the meal talking about video games and school and such. When we arrived home, Ryan went into his room. Apparently, he had an assignment due in one of his classes that he had put off all week. Just another part of who he is. All of my assignments were finished, so I had the evening to myself. I got on my computer and chatted with my friends for a while. One of my friends was having a problem with his girlfriend. Apparently, I'm the guy to come to for help on everything. I don't really do a lot of dating, so I don't know how much my advice is going to help. But I do what I can.

I leaned back in my chair trying to stretch out my back and arms. I glanced over at the clock on the wall. "Oh man, seven forty five, already? I gotta get my practice in." I had been taking Aikido for almost three years now. It was supposed to help me focus and teach me discipline. I really just do it to unwind though. It gives me time to relax and sort out all the annoying crap in my life so I can reflect on the good things. I said my goodbyes to my friends and logged out of my messenger. It' was too cluttered in my room to practice there, I would have to clean it later. I could hear Ryan's music playing as I stepped out into the living room. At least he wasn't sitting out here playing video games. Although for all I knew, he was playing them on his computer instead of doing his homework.

I took a deep breath and began slowly going through my stances. My arm hit something as I started my third one, and a plate fell to the floor. I reached down quickly and caught it before it hit the tile. I let out a long sigh. "At least I know this stuff works for something. It's going to be a long weekend." I set the dish back on the counter and stepped further away. I closed my eyes and imagined myself far away from civilization, on a high mountain miles and miles from the nearest sign of human life. Sensei recommended this trick to me to free my mind from distraction. I focused on the peaceful mountaintops as I continued my practice. The snow covered tips, and the valleys contrasting with the peaks. Ryan's music slowly drifted from my consciousness. It was quiet, and I could almost feel the wind running through my hair as I practiced. I felt completely at peace. Slowly, I opened my eyes… and then shut them quickly.

"Okay… this time I'm going to open my eyes and I won't still see the mountains." I slowly opened my eyes again. The mountains that I had seen when I had my eyes closed, now stood directly in front of me even with my eyes open. Dark mountains crested with white snow in every direction as far as I could see. From the look of it, I was about half way up one of them, on a path that seemed to be cut into the side of it. "Oh man, I knew this was going to be a long weekend. I wonder what Sensei would think about this."

I sat down on the ground and considered my position. One possibility was that I fell asleep while practicing. Probably the most likely. Another possibility was that I was dead. Don't know how, but it was a possibility. A third possibility was that I had entered one of those visions, or spiritual journeys that sensei sometimes spoke about. And finally, there was a small chance that I had by some freak chance, teleported to the middle of a mountain range. If one of the first two possibilities was the case, then it really didn't matter what I did. If it was one of the latter two possibilities, then I would probably need to get moving, because just sitting around wasn't going to get me anywhere. So all in all, it was in my best interests to move.

"Well, better start walking." I stood up, brushed off my jeans, and started heading down the trail, hopefully toward the bottom of the mountain. For being halfway up a mountain, it wasn't very cold. It felt like it was about sixty-five to seventy degrees. The trail was plenty wide. I took my time and looked around a lot. Few people ever get to see scenery like this, even if it was just a dream. And if it wasn't a dream, then panicking wasn't going to do me any good, anyway.

I felt something hit the top of my head, so I stopped walking and looked up. About a hundred feet up, the mountain jutted outward over the path I was walking on. A few pebbles were falling off of the cliff. They were falling in a pattern that moved forward slowly. Was there someone walking up there? I watched the trail of rocks move for a few seconds, hoping to catch a glimpse of what, or who, was causing it. I heard a yell and then saw the edge of the cliff crumble and a figure fall through. It looked like a child. I had to try to save him. Adrenaline kicked in and I dashed ahead as fast as I could, praying that I reached him in time. I leapt forward and extended my arms just in time to catch him and skid across the ground. "That's gunna hurt in the morning…" I opened my eyes and looked at the child to make sure he was all right. "What the hell?"

What was in my arms was definitely not a child. At least not a human child. It was slightly larger than an adult house cat, but was tiger striped. In fact, it could have been a baby tiger, if not for the tail. The tail was about two feet long and looked like it had gone through the dryer. It was puffed up to about nine inches thick. No, it wasn't puffed up… it actually was that thick. Like a large club attached to its rear. Its eyes were still closed.

"Hey, are you…" what the heck am I thinking? It's a cat, it can't understand me. It slowly opened its eyes and looked at me. Its eyes were large and violet coloured. A thought occurred to me; I was holding a potentially injured baby tiger. If the mother was around, she would not be happy. I set the tiger down on its feet and took a step back. It continued to stare at me.

"You saved my life, sir."

It just spoke to me. And it didn't sound like a baby. I recalled Sensei mentioning that sometimes in a spiritual journey or vision, one would see a spirit guide. Although I wouldn't think that most people have to save their spirit guides.

"I am known as Tigemon, and I am forever in your debt."

"Uh, hi. I'm Hank Felix, but my friends call me Tank. Are you… my spirit guide?"

He cocked his head to the side and looked up at me. "Well, I'm no spirit. I would be happy to guide you to wherever you are headed. After all, you did just save me."

"Uh, I guess that works…" is this real? It is… just a dream… isn't it? "Well Tigemon, I'm sort of lost. I don't know where I am and I don't know how I got here. So I guess I'd really like it if you could guide me home."

"Well sir, I must sadly inform you that I do not know where your home is, though if I did, I would gladly take you there."

"I don't suppose you would know where Indiana is, would you?"

"Have never even heard of it."

"Hmmmm." I thought for a few seconds and eventually decided that further questions on the subject were likely to get me no where. I then recalled that he had been walking up the mountain before he had fallen through. "Where were you going?"

"Me? I was headed to the top of the mountain. It is said that a great and powerful Digimon lives at the summit."

"A… Digimon?" Why did that word sound familiar? I didn't recall ever hearing it before, but it sounded like a word that I knew.

Tigemon went on with his explanation. "Yes I was headed up the mountain to meet with this great Digimon and ask him a question, but I slipped on that narrow edge up there and fell through. Which brings us to you saving me."

"Well, how about if I go with you? We'll go visit this great Digimon together and then I can ask him if he knows how I can get home. We could help each other out. What do you say?"

Tigemon nodded. "As you wish, sir" Tigemon turned around and began heading up the mountain trail. I followed close behind him. He kept his tail perfectly straight behind him as he walked, and his feet landed perfectly inline. After a few minutes of walking up the trail, we eventually made it to the spot where Tigemon had fallen through the cliff. The gap was fairly wide, much too far for me to jump across, and judging from the size of him, it was likely too far for Tigemon to jump, either. We were stuck, it seemed.

"So… what do we do now?" I asked as Tigemon looked around for a way across. Eventually his gaze landed above the gap. I followed it up to a very large chunk of rock sticking out of the mountain. It looked fairly loose.

"You may want to take a few steps back, sir," he muttered without turning his focus from the rock. I took his advice and stepped back about twenty feet. He kept his eyes glued to the rock, and lightly tapped his tail on the ground. He stepped back about three feet, and then tapped his tail on the ground again. He stepped back one fore foot, tapped his tail one more time, and then swung his tail as far from the wall as he could. He waved it a couple of times like a batter preparing to hit a home run, and then slammed his tail into the side of the mountain with an incredibly loud noise. A large crack splintered its way from where he hit the wall with his tail all the way up to the boulder lodged in the wall. He turned around and ran back to my side as the bolder fell from its spot and landed on the gap, covering it perfectly.

Once the dust settled, Tigemon walked up to the stone slab and jumped on top of it. He turned his head back and looked at me with a smile on his face. "You coming?" he asked. I walked up to the rock and climbed up on top.

"Neat trick."

"I can sense vibrations in the ground. The rest is just hitting the right spot with a hard enough object."

"Like your tail?""

"Exactly."

"That's pretty cool."

"Why thank you, sir."

We walked to the other side of the large boulder and jumped back down to the path. We continued up the mountain, spiraling around and around. After a while I decided to start some conversation to pass the time.

"So, what's the name of this great and powerful Digimon?"

"I actually do not know."

"Ok, do you know what he looks like?"

"No, all I know is that he is a very powerful Digimon, and some believe that he is as old as the digital world itself."

"So, how will you know it's him and not some imposter pretending to be him?"

"I suppose I wouldn't know for certain, although if I were that old and powerful, I would probably not look fondly on those who would mock me."

"I guess that's a good point. So what are you going to ask him?"

"If it's alright, sir, I'd rather not say." He sounded kind of embarrassed.

"Oh, I'm sorry. It's something private, I understand. I didn't mean to pry."

"No, it's just, if anyone found out… well, they would never understand."

"I'm sure your friends would understand."

"Well… I dunno." He sounded down. I decided to stop pushing the topic. Besides, we were almost at the top.

Walking up the last bit of ramp, we came to the summit. It was large and flat, about a hundred square feet in any direction, at least. But no one was there. "So… do we ring the bell?"

Tigemon looked around in confusion. "I don't understand. He should be here."

"Maybe he's out to lunch"

"I was told he never leaves this spot."

"Maybe something important came up."

I heard something behind us. It was soft, as if it was still not quite at the summit.

"Yeah, well you cheated!"

"How the hell do you cheat in a foot race?" said a second voice. That voice sounded really familiar.

"I don't know, but I'm still going to win," replied the first voice.

"I don't think so. I'm almost there, junior." The voices were getting closer. "Got it! I win!" Ryan suddenly leaped into view, landing at the top of the mountain. Just behind him, a creature that looked like a small raptor wearing goggles ran up the slope and stopped next to him. Both were gasping for air. The small reptile looked up at Ryan.

"You suck, I can't get up to top speed on these narrow winding paths."

"I fail to see how that's my fault." Ryan said between breaths.

"And you cheated!" yelled the small reptile.

Ryan smiled. "Dude, you can't cheat in a foot race."

"Pretending that you sprained your ankle so that I'll come back to make sure you're ok is cheating."

"Oh please, if I told you I wrote the word 'gullible' on a rock somewhere down the mountain, would you go look for it?" I smiled. Typical Ryan. I didn't know who the dinosaur thing was, but this was obviously Ryan.

"Hey Ryan! What the hell are you doing here?" I shouted over to him. He looked up in surprise and saw me standing about twenty feet away.

"Tank! I didn't know you were hanging out in the digital world after school."

Tigemon looked up at me. "Do you know this person, sir?" he asked.

"Yeah, he lives with me." I replied.

Once Ryan caught his breath, he came running over. "Hey, you have a Digimon friend, too. What's his name?"

Tigemon looked at Ryan. "I am Tigemon."

"We just met today," I explained.

"This is Jetomon," Ryan said, signaling to the raptor at his side. "So is this your first day here?" Ryan asked.

"Yeah. Wait, you've been coming here after school all week, haven't you? That's why you never needed a ride home from school and always showed up late."

"You better believe it." He replied with a grin.

"So you know how to get home, don't you?" I asked him.

"Well, sort of. I'll explain on the way back down. Kali is waiting at the bottom of the mountain with dinner."

"Kali's here, too?"

"Yeah, she's been coming here with me for a couple of days now."

"Alright, let's go," I said.

"Excuse me," Tigemon interjected. "Do you know where the ancient Digimon who lives here is?"

"Oh, that's right," I said, remembering. "That was the entire reason we came up here."

Ryan looked puzzled. "I don't know anything about any ancient Digimon. Do you, Jetomon?"

Jetomon looked just as puzzled. "No, I've been using this mountain to train for as long as I can remember, and I've never seen any ancient Digimon living up here. Sorry."

Tigemon looked discouraged. "That's alright. I'll just have to figure something else out."

"Hey Tigemon, would you like to come down and have dinner with me and my friends?" I offered.

"I couldn't intrude like that, sir."

"Oh please, I insist. It's fine with you, right Ryan?" I looked over at Ryan.

Ryan smiled. "Of course, the more the merrier, and all that crap."

Tigemon seemed to cheer up. "Well, if you insist, sir."

We walked down the mountain as Ryan explained his first trip here and Kali's first trip here. Then he explained that they could both go home by doing the thing they were doing when they arrived, like running for Ryan or using the computer for Kali, and that I could probably get back by my desire to return home and practicing my martial arts, like I was doing when I got here.

When we finally got to the base of the mountain, Kali was sitting on a picnic blanket. Next to a small fire and had some food cooking in a large pan over the fire. More food was already laid out over the blanket. It seems there are no flies or ants in the digital world, thus making it the perfect picnic place. Kali introduced me to her Digimon friend, Knifemon, although when Knifemon offered to show me how she got her name, Kali stopped her and told her maybe later.

The six of us sat down on the picnic blanket and enjoyed the food Kali had made. She had made curry and rice, with hot and sour soup. Afterwards, we chatted for a while and had a good time. This was definitely better than hanging out at the apartment, or anywhere on campus. And even though we didn't get to meet the ancient powerful Digimon that Tigemon was looking for, we still had a great time, and I knew we were going to have a lot more fun in the future. If all went well, I was in for a lot of excitement in my trips to the Digital world.

"Hey Ryan."

"Yeah Tank?"

"Who is that?"

Author Notes: Only one character left to introduce. Yay!

Who is the ancient digimon that was mysteriously not on the mountain? Who knows! (Ok, I do, but I'm not telling you.)

Who did Tank see at the end of the story? Who knows again! (Ok, I know that one too, but I'm also not telling you, not that it would be hard to guess. Besides, you won't have long to wait to find that one out, anyway.)

Chapter 4 coming soon!

... chicken...


	4. Chapter 4: Puppy Power

You know, if I got enough stock in the company, I could sort of own Digimon...

But sadly, no. I have no stock in... well, anything.

Eeek! I own nothing!

Author note: By special request, I have included mentions of more season 1/2 children. See if you can find the two I mentioned by name and the two that I don't name but give clues for.

_Chapter 4_

_Puppy Power_

"I'm sorry, I'm not really interested in having a relationship right now. But I'll always be your friend, okay?"

The nervousness in his face drained into sadness. "Oh, ummm… yeah. Of course." He turned around and walked down the hall.

"Wow, that was harsh." Harper commented from behind me.

"Do you really think so? I tried to be nice, I really do like him. I just don't want to start dating yet."

"You're a frost queen and you don't even realize it. Lily, you are one of a kind."

"You think so?" I asked, smiling.

"Clueless, too." She sighed. "C'mon, let's head home." We began walking out of our high school towards Harper's car. She had gotten her license last year, and mom and dad bought her a car for her last birthday. They decided I didn't need a license or a car since Harper had hers and she could drive me to school and back. I did get a new computer, though, a MacBook Pro. I guess that's a decent trade.

I spotted her car in the parking lot. It wasn't difficult to find. It was bright orange with two broad black stripes running down it. It said "SALENE" across the back in giant letters. I sometimes wondered if she had gotten her car endorsed by some eye-drop company, but I was kind of afraid to ask. Instead, I just climbed into the passenger seat as Harper got in on the driver's side, started the car, and began driving home.

"Hey, when did you put these stickers on?"

"Oh, I put them on yesterday afternoon. You didn't notice them on the drive in this morning?"

She had put large letters across the top of the windshield so that her car now boldly spoke, "HOPE OR DIE". Our last name was Hope. It was a phrase she used as often as she could. "No, I guess I wasn't paying attention. I like it, though."

"Riiiiight… anyway, why do you continuously shoot down every guy that asks you out?"

"I dunno… I guess I just can't narrow it down. I have so many friends; I wouldn't want to single anybody out. And I don't know if there is any guy I like more than the rest of my friends. I just like everybody, I guess."

"Well, if you keep turning down every offer, people are gonna start thinking that you're playing for the wrong team."

"Wrong team? But I don't even play any sports. And what does that have to do with anything?" I asked. I had no idea what she was talking about.

She shook her head. "Nevermind. Lily will be Lily, as usual." She frequently left her comments completely unexplained. Sometimes I could get Kurt to explain it to me when he was home from college, but he wasn't going to be home for another two weeks. I'll be lucky if I can remember all of this by then.

Harper pulled into our driveway and parked in our spot, next to the other four cars. Mom's car, Dad's car, Milton's car, and the van we used when we all go somewhere together. There was a lot of space left in the driveway for Kurt's car, Rumiko's car, Arthur's car, and Shelly's car. Kurt, Rumiko and Arthur were in college. Shelly was almost finished with medical school. Arthur was getting ready to graduate with a degree in forensics. Rumiko was studying abroad, somewhere in Japan, I think. Kurt just started college somewhere in Indiana. I think he was still undecided, but he seemed to be stirring up plenty of trouble while he was up there. Milton, Harper, and I were still in high school. Milton was a senior and was already accepted to college where he planned on majoring in religious studies. Harper and I were juniors. Harper wanted to be a lawyer. I had no idea what I wanted to do. I just knew I wanted to get out of Arkansas. We walked inside the house. Milton was already home. He gets to skip homeroom and go home early. He was sitting in the living room playing some video game where a group of kids were fighting a bunch of weird looking dark creatures. One of his characters grabbed a gun from his hip and shot himself in the head. Some other weird creature appeared above him and slashed the creatures with a sword. I don't know how he gets these games by Mom and Dad.

Mom and Dad were in their room talking. I announced that I was home and then went to my room to do my homework. Math, yuck… English, yuck… Science, yuck… I don't know what I'm going to do with my life, I kinda suck at everything. I like school, just not the work. Too bad I can't make a living off of hanging out with my friends.

Mom called that dinner was ready. Several pizzas were on the table. I guess she didn't feel like cooking and decided to order out instead. After dinner, Mom announced that we had received a letter from Rumiko. She pulled out an envelope that had several stamps with cherry blossoms and funny looking letters on them. It was addressed to Scott and Zelda Hope. She opened it up and started reading it to us. It wasn't a very long letter. She sent us about one letter a week. She was getting used to the new name she had picked out for living in Japan. Her classes were going really well. She had made lots of friends. One of her friends, Natsuki Takaishi, is the niece of the family she is living with, Taichi and Sora Yagami. She spent a lot of time at the flower shop that the Yagami's owned. Normally the two of them run it on their own, so a little help was appreciated. She ended her letter by saying that she was going to go shopping in Akihabara next week, so the next thing we get should be a large box full of souvenirs. It sounded like she was having a lot of fun out there.

After putting the dishes in the dishwasher, I went back to my room for the rest of the night. I turned on some music to relax. I had been trying to learn to dance over the last couple of weeks. It wasn't a career by any means, or at least not one that my parents would approve of, but it made me happy, and it was one of the few things that I did for me and no one else. I let the music soak into myself and let it guide my steps. I closed my eyes and rid myself of all distractions. Just the music and my movements. Well, and my own thoughts. I wasn't getting away from those anytime soon. It seemed like everyone in my family had their whole life figured out. Even Kurt, who hadn't decided on his major yet, seemed to know what he was doing. I think he just got a kick out of not letting anyone else know. I don't really know what's left to do, though. I don't want to do something that someone else in my family is doing. I already get all the hand-me-downs from six older siblings. I want something different, something new. I'm tired of being compared to other people. I want to do something that will take my whole family by surprise. Maybe even the whole world.

The music stopped abruptly. I looked over at my CD player to see what happened. But my CD player was gone. "Ummm… w-what's going on. W-where am I?" My whole room was gone. In fact, the whole house was gone. I was standing in a large field full of tall grass and flowers. That was all there was as far as I could see in any direction, although that wasn't all that far, as the field was covered in a thick fog and it was dark. "Hello?" I started rubbing my arms. It was getting cold and I was regretting having worn a skirt today, even if it was a long skirt. The blouse wasn't helping much either. "Hello?" I called a little louder. I was getting scared. I was in an unknown place, and had no idea how I got here. It was really cold, colder than it should have been in Arkansas at seven at night. The fog was really thick. I couldn't see more than ten feet in any direction. "Hello?" Why wouldn't anybody answer? Where were Mom and Dad? Where were Harper and Milton? I could feel tears begin to well up in my eyes. If this was some kind of nightmare, I was really hoping it would end soon.

Something caught my attention. There was some noise other than the wind. At least, for a second… I thought… I closed my eyes to listen more closely. It was difficult to make out anything over the howling of the wind. Wait, that was it! It was howling. It sounded like some sort of animal making noise. It wasn't scary howling. It didn't sound like a wolf or anything. It was higher pitched like a small animal. It might not have been human, but I would be thrilled to see any sign of life at this point. Besides, it was possible that wherever I had gotten lost, they had sent a search party with a search dog to look for me. I began walking slowly toward the noise, although it was difficult to tell which direction it was coming from because of how far away it was and all the noise from the wind interfering. Maybe if I started making noise as well, they might hear me and be able to come to me. "Hello? Can anybody hear me? I'm over here! Hello?"

The howling sound stopped. I looked around, worried that whoever it was had given up. Then something came through the fog. "Awww… it's a puppy!" A small dog, no larger than a Chihuahua, had appeared through the fog and stood directly in front of me. It had an oddly large head and ears for it's small body. It was absolutely adorable and I had an overwhelming urge to pick it up and squeeze it. But then I remembered… shouldn't there be some people with a rescue dog? I looked around but all I could see was the tiny dog staring back at me.

"So, do you need help or something?"

I jumped. "Ah! W-who said that?"

"I did. I heard you yelling, so I came to see what you needed."

I still couldn't see anybody except… the puppy. I looked at it trying to figure out if it could have been the source of this voice I was hearing. It responded as if it knew what I had been thinking.

"What's the matter? Haven't you seen a Salamon before?"

"Ummm… I guess not… I don't think I've ever seen a talking dog before."

"I'm not a dog, I'm a Salamon. So, do you need help or not?"

"Oh, ummm… I was just looking for my family."

"Well, I should be able to help you find them." She raised her nose up and sniffed a bit. Then turned her head a sniffed again. "Hey, I think I found them!"

"Really?" I was shocked. I was beginning to think that no one would be here.

"Yeah, follow me. If you lose track of me in the fog, then just follow the sound my Puppy Howling attack."

"Attack?"

"Don't worry, I can control it to make sure it doesn't hurt you. It was the same thing I used to find you earlier."

"Oh, alright." It made sense. We started walking, Salamon taking the lead. I followed along behind her, trying to work out all that was happening. Somehow I had teleported from my room to an empty grassy area full of fog. And now I was being led through the fog by a talking puppy. Maybe I really was dreaming…

"So, I told you my name, what's your name?"

"Oh, ummm… my name is Lily. Lily Hope."

"Nice to meet you Lily Hope."

"You… you can just call me Lily."

"Okay Lily."

As we walked further, I noticed the fog thinning out. I could see some of the area around me now. We were in a large grassy field. I hadn't noticed all of the pretty flowers before. Had I just not paid enough attention because I was stressed out about being lost? Off in the distance I could see mountains coming into sight. My house was nowhere in sight, though. Had my entire family somehow transported out here along with me?

"So how far away are they?"

"We're almost there. Just a little further up."

As she said it, I saw a trio of people up ahead talking to each other around a campfire. They all appeared to be a few years older than me. There was a boy wearing blue jean shorts and a white t-shirt, with a button up shirt over it, unbuttoned, with blue flames on it. One of the sleeves was torn off and his short brown hair was spiked back. He was running around chasing an odd looking lizard that had blue goggles on its head. There was another boy, taller and broader than the first, wearing blue jeans and an orange t-shirt. He had short blonde hair and he was wearing orange training wraps on his hands. He was sitting on a large rock talking to a stripped cat. It looked like a small tiger. Finally there was a girl wearing black boots and a trench coat, with long black hair emerging from a black messenger hat. She had a gray backpack next to her with a white laptop sticking part way out. She was standing over the fire cooking something while talking to a large purple guinea pig with silver stripes. Was Salamon one of these strange creatures, too? More importantly, these people were not my family.

"Well, here we are," said Salamon.

"But, this… I don't know these people," I replied.

"Hey Ryan," one of the boys spoke.

"Yeah Tank?" the other replied.

"Who is that?" the first boy asked.

Everybody turned and looked at me. "I don't know," the one named Ryan said. "Hey!" he shouted to me. "Who are you? What are you doing here?" He started running toward me and the lizard with him came running behind him, swiftly passing him.

I let out a small scream and turned and ran. Salamon started running with me. I turned my head and looked behind me. The lizard was catching up quickly. "Hey, get back here!" it yelled.

"Why are they chasing us?" Salamon asked.

"I don't know," I replied. "I don't even know who these people are."

"Cover your ears," she said.

"Why"

"Trust me."

I put my hands over my ears. Salamon jumped forward turning around in the air and screeching to a halt as she landed. As I ran past her I turned my head back again to look at her.

"Puppy Howling!" she yelled. Even with my ears covered, it hurt my ears. The lizard tripped and grunted in pain as he tumbled and slid to a stop a few feet from Salamon. Salamon turned and ran to catch up with me. The human that was following the lizard had put his hands over his ears as soon as Salamon started her attack.

"Jetomon!" he called out as he ran up to the lizard and stopped to make sure it was ok. Salamon and I used the opportunity to make a quick escape back into the fog. Once we were certain that we were far enough away, we stopped running to catch our breath. I looked over at Salamon and she looked up at me.

"How come you attacked him?" I asked.

"Well, he was chasing us. I wasn't about to save you from the fog just to have you attacked by a mob of humans and Digimon," she replied.

Digimon… was that what those creatures were? Was that what Salamon was? Well, Salamon had helped me out a lot, so I guess she was all right. "Thanks for helping me out, Salamon."

"No problem. I'm always there to help someone in need."

That's right. I was lost and looking for my family. I still didn't know where they were. Or I guess where I was. Salamon must have noticed the worried look on my face.

"Don't worry," she said. "I won't leave until we figure out how to get you back to your family. I just smelled more humans and thought they must have been who you were looking for. But I'll stay with you."

"Thanks," I replied. "I'm getting really tired and it's cold. Is there somewhere warm I could go to get some sleep?"

"Yeah, you can come with me. I've got a nice place where I stay that keeps out the wind and the cold. Follow me." Salamon started walking off and I followed closely behind her. After a few minutes of walking, we came up to a small house in the middle of a large field. There was a hole under the door where I presumed that Salamon was digging under it. I grabbed the handle and opened the door. We stepped inside. The house was very plain. There were a few different rooms but they were all empty, save for one room with a table and a chair. There were no windows and no decorations of any kind.

"This place is… nice."

"Yeah, it's pretty plain, but it keeps the weather out. I found it a few days ago. I had never seen anything like it before, but it was nice anyway."

I looked around the rooms. One of the smaller rooms that I figured was a closet had a blanket in it. I grabbed it and walked into the room with the chair and table. Salamon had climbed onto the table and was sleeping. I curled up in the blanket on the floor and took out the scrunchy that kept my ponytail up. It had been a long night; one that I was still hoping was just a bad dream. Of course, if it was just a dream, then my new friend Salamon would be nothing more than part of my dream. I didn't really want to lose this new friend, either. I just hoped that I would find my way home soon. Maybe my luck would improve tomorrow. For now, it was enough that I had found help to get back home. I was lost in a strange land far from my family, but at least I wasn't alone. I guess it wasn't so bad after all. Still, I wonder if my family has noticed that I'm missing yet…

Author notes:

Every member of Lily's family (not including Lily herself) is named after a famous writer. The hardest one to get is Rumiko. She is much more contemporary than the others and is obviously Japanese. She writes a few famous anime that still get plenty of attention. For instance, an anime about a dog with a sword... (sit boy!)

The game that Milton is playing near the beginning of the story is Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3. A rather controversial title in America due to it's heavy religious themes (another clue to the origin of his name) not to mention the whole shooting yourself in the head thing. Game is awesome.

The ending of this chapter even took me by surprise. This was not the original ending of this chapter. It was a last second change that will also alter the next few chapter a bit as well. I like it better this way though.

As most of my readers probably know, Salamon, unlike the other three Digimon in my story, is an already existing Digimon. So, if you can't picture it very well, you can google it or something.

Hope or Die! Yes, I thought it up. Yes, it's pretty cheesy. No, I don't care, I'm going to use and abuse it throughout the entire story.

I appologize for the delay in this chapter. My powercord broke part way into typing it. It took me two weeks to get a new one. Then when I finally got a new one, I got really sick for about a week and a half. Not pretty.

Now that I'm finaly finished introducing my main cast, I can actually get to some decent storyline. And the evolutions that you are probably all waiting for. Chapter 5 should be out soon.


	5. Chapter 5: Sonic Speed

Disclaimer: I disclaim owning things... Repent!

Wait... nevermind... or do mind... whichever your preference, I don't mind.

Author notes:

YAY! Finally finished with all of the introduction chapters. Now the only people I need to introduce are lowly NPCs. Ummm... that's Non-imPortant-Characters... in case you were curious... What, you think I'm making this stuff up?

On to meat and potatoes. Mmmmmmm... steak...

_Chapter 5_

_Sonic Speed_

"So, if you differentiate the position, your result will be the velocity. Then you can differentiate the velocity and get the acceleration…" on and on and on. This class would not end. And I couldn't focus on it to save my life. Who was that girl? It had been three days since we saw her in the digital world. It just didn't add up. None of us had ever seen her before. And why did her Digimon attack Jetomon? I know Digimon do a lot of fighting, that much I had figured out from Jetomon. But for some reason, I just never expected Digimon paired with humans to fight each other. And what's the point of appearing before us just to run away without a word? It's just…

"Ryan Goodspeed!"

I jumped out of my seat. "Wha… uh, yes, sir?"

"I don't suppose you could tell me the answer."

Damn… every day. "Ummm… thirteen?" It was my lucky number. I had a feeling from the laughter of the other students that it wasn't so lucky this time.

"So, what you are telling me, Mr. Goodspeed, is that if you integrate the velocity, your end result is thirteen, correct?"

I hung my head a little. "Position, sir."

"Hmmm… Mr. Goodspeed has the potential. Perhaps if he paid a little more attention, he wouldn't be failing my class. Alright, on to the next problem, class."

I couldn't help it. I usually had problems focusing in class, but it had become an impossible battle lately. With all of the excitement in the digital world and the question of that girl, I don't know how anybody could expect me to pay attention in calculus class. Not that I could really offer that as an excuse to any of my teachers.

The bell finally rang. Other students started packing their books into their various bags as the teacher continued talking. "Alright, that's it for today's class. Homework for Wednesday is…" I left the class as quickly as I could without running. This was my last class for the day and I wanted to go back to the digital world today. Tank and Kali were probably already there. I had the latest class on Mondays. Once I got out of the building, I broke into a sprint. I couldn't wait to get back. I'm sure Jetomon was there waiting for me as well. He had been staying in my room with me since we met, but he usually spent the days back in the digital world. He was able to get back and forth the same way I could: at top speed.

For some reason that no one seemed to be able to figure out, I could run through an amphitheatre full of people, transport to the digital world, and not one single person would notice. I kinda wanted to test the limitations to that. Could I run into traffic and teleport just before getting hit by a vehicle? Surely someone would notice then. But I figured if some mystic force kept the normal people from noticing my disappearances, then I should probably be grateful and move on.

As I ran by, my surrounding blending into the digital world, people glanced away to look across the street, or stop to tie their shoes. I sprinted past until all of the people faded from my vision and I found myself in the grassy plain we usually met in. As I expected, Tank and Kali were already there, along with Tigemon, Knifemon, and Jetomon. I slowed to a stop by the rest of the group. "So, what's on today's agenda?" I asked.

"I dunno," Tank replied. "Kali said she had something important, but hasn't said anything else yet." Tank was wearing his usual orange shirt with blue jeans, but also wore a denim jacket with a bandana tied around the left sleeve, and had a canteen on one hip and a pair of binoculars on the other. I guess he was preparing for a long stay here. Maybe I should have brought a jacket.

Kali stood up from the rock she had been sitting on. "Well, now that we're all here, I can get to my point. Either of you check the news today?"

I looked at her with a confused look on my face. "News?"

She chuckled a little, "Yeah hun, the news. Ya know, newspaper, TV, Internet. Tells you what's happening here, there, everywhere."

"Yeah, thanks," I responded. "I don't have time to check the news. Too much stuff to do."

"I try not to watch it either. I already realize the world sucks," said Tank.

Kali rolled her eyes. "Well, at least one of us checks the net every once in a while." She turned her laptop around and showed us the page displayed on the screen. "Check out the story on this page."

I looked over the page. "Aliens visit President at Camp David?"

"Not that one, you dolt! The one below it," she yelled at me.

I looked down toward the bottom of the page. There was a group of pictures of children of different ages and races under the heading, "Have you seen this child?" I looked through the pictures of all the kids and then stopped on one of them. There was a girl in a blouse with her hair tied up in a ponytail. The caption under said her name was Lily Hope from a town called Bentonville, Arkansas. Something about her held my attention. "Why does this girl seem so familiar to me?" I asked.

Tank answered. "Is this the girl from the other day?" He was right, it did look a lot like her.

Kali shut her laptop and placed it back inside her bag. "I think it is. She was pretty far away and it was dark, but I think this may be her."

"Yeah, and she ran away and had here Digimon attack me when I tried to follow her. I still don't understand why she did that." I added.

Tank looked at me like I was an idiot. "Are you serious? You just suddenly bolted after her demanding to know who she was and why she was here. She's lost in the digital world and you scare her half to death. Her Digimon attacking Jetomon was nothing more than self defense."

"Oh, I uh… guess I came on a little aggressive, huh?" I asked scratching my head.

Kali joined in on picking at me. "Understatement if I ever heard one. Anyway, the article says that she has been missing for three days and the police have no leads. They can't determine if it was a kidnapping or a runaway, however, there was no sign of forced entry in her room, so runaway seems more likely. Her family says she was in her room listening to music and when they came by to say goodnight, she was gone. No one saw her leave."

"How do you get internet signal on that thing here?" I asked.

"Ryan, we're in the digital world. We may as well be in the internet," she replied.

"So…" Tank said. "You think she was listening to music in her room and transported to the digital world. And now she doesn't know how to get back? But how did she get here from Arkansas in such a short time? I mean, we saw her that night."

"It is possible," Kali began, "that the digital world doesn't have an Indiana or an Arkansas. As we all figured out, we get here by desiring something more in our lives. Whatever it is we desire, perhaps this place has the most potential for that in the digital world. Then no matter where we were in our world, we would always appear in the same place in the digital world."

"So she's been lost in an unknown land full of frightening monsters, no offense," Tank motioned to Tigemon, "for three days now, with no idea how to get back and probably no idea how she even got here.

"So it would seem." Kali responded.

"Well what are we waiting for?" I shouted. "Let's go rescue her!" I started running to go save her, but Kali's voice stopped me.

"Ryan, where do you think you are going?"

"To go rescue her," I replied.

"Uh huh, and where do you think you are going?" she asked again.

"Ummmm…" I thought for a while. "I have no idea," I admitted.

"Get back here before you hurt yourself," Tank said.

"Right," I said, walking back to the group.

"Now, Knifemon has made an interesting observation," Kali said sitting back down on her rock. "Knifemon, if you would."

Knifemon stepped forward a bit. "I went back to the house that Kali and I found shelter in during the blizzard last week. I found a blanket on the floor big enough for a human, and a smaller blanket on the table. Those blankets weren't there when Kali and I were."

"That could be Lily and her Digimon," said Tank. "But it could also just be two Digimon."

"Not likely, sir," said Tigemon. "If Digimon do stay in any kind of group, it is almost exclusively with members of their own kind. Also, most Digimon prefer live in solitude, and the ones that do live in a pack do so for the safety in numbers. A pair of Digimon would be most unheard of."

"Right, so it is highly unlikely that it isn't this other human and her Salamon," said Jetomon.

"You know what Digimon she had, Jetomon?" Kali asked.

"He did get close enough to get attacked by it," I replied. "I saw it, too. I just didn't know what it was called."

"Hmmm… let me punch that into this new program I found," Kali said. She opened her computer back up and punched several keys before a voice from the computer came out.

"Salamon: vaccine type holy Digimon. Rookie level. Excels in distracting opponents with long-range howls that are extremely painful to anyone within range. Special attack is 'Puppy Howling'"

Tank looked as shocked as I did. "Where the heck did you find that?" I asked.

"I found it online while I was waiting on the two of you," she replied. "I'm guessing that it can only be found by people in the digital world. I went ahead and looked up all of our Digimon while I was waiting."

She punched a few more keys and the computer started speaking again. "Knifemon: vaccine type machine Digimon. Rookie level. A balanced fighter that uses blades for close and medium range combat. Special attack is 'Kunai Storm'"

She continued typing and the voice went straight into the next Digimon. "Tigemon: data type beast Digimon. Rookie level. Excels in close combat by overpowering opponents with physical strength. Special attack is 'Stars and Stripes'"

"Why 'Stars and Stripes'?" Tank asked.

"Because my tail is striped and if it hits you, you'll see stars," answered Tigemon with a grin.

"Do Jetomon next," I said excitedly.

"I'm getting there," she said still typing. The computer started again. "Jetomon: virus type dragon Digimon. Rookie level. Excels in high-speed combat attacking in rapid succession. Special attack is 'Sonic Boom'"

"Virus type?" I asked. "Is there something wrong with Jetomon?"

"Not exactly," replied Kali. "Being a virus type just means that he's a little more eager to fight than other Digimon. It also means he'll fair a little better in a fight with data types and a little worse in a fight against vaccine types."

"That's why I was able to defeat Monochromon, who is a champion level, but I got sent for a loop by Salamon in one hit," explained Jetomon.

I had almost forgotten that first night when I was attacked by Monochromon. "Well, I guess I'm always ready for a fight, too. So I guess we make a good pair."

"Well," Tank started. "If we know where she is, then we should go find her and see what's going on. It is also possible that she doesn't want to go home. This could actually be a runaway."

"It's likely that Lily only returns there at night to sleep. We can head over there and do a stakeout. Knifemon, since you are the only one who remembers how to get back to that house, would you please lead the way?"

Knifemon nodded with her whole body. "Absolutely!" She started walking and we all followed behind: very slowly. I don't do slowly, and Knifemon's legs were about 2 inches long each. After about two minutes, I just couldn't take it anymore.

"Alright, that's it." Everybody turned to look at me. "Knifemon, if you don't mind." I said as I picked her up. I gently placed her on Jetomon's head. "There, I just tripled our pace. Now we might get there before nightfall." Kali just rolled her eyes. Tank grinned and then looked at Tigemon. He held out his hands and Tigemon jumped into his arms and then up to his shoulders. Now we could move. We were still walking, but anyone with legs less than a foot long was now in the care of someone else. Much better.

"So," Tank said, breaking the silence. "I've been wondering this for a little while. Why is it that all of the Digimon knew about humans, but us humans knew nothing about Digimon?"

"I knew about Digimon," I said. Kali and Tank stared at me like I was insane. "Well, okay I didn't really know a lot. I just sort of knew what Digimon were and what the digital world was. I don't really know how I knew. It was just… like I always knew. I can't really explain it, I just knew." They were still staring at me. It was rather uncomfortable and I was hoping somebody would change the subject. Thankfully, Jetomon took over for me.

"Human's have been coming to the digital world for a long time. Since the creation of the digital world, in fact. It's not very frequent, in fact it is generally only a few kids every decade or so. Humans are famous in the digital world, partnering with a human is said to unlock the maximum potential of a Digimon. Human children are generally summoned in times of great need to battle some unspeakable evil. Although some Digimon will get jealous and attack Digimon hoping that the human will partner with it instead.

"I thought you said that a lot of Digimon blamed humans for the problems of the digital world." I asked Jetomon confused.

"Well," continued Jetomon, "while humans do come to help save the world, they are also the ones who created and maintain the digital world. So large problems are sort of caused by the humans as well."

"It's that whole adults screw up and kids have to fix it thing," added Tank.

"Does that mean that we're here to save the world?" I asked getting a little excited at the idea of heroism and all that fun stuff.

"It's possible," answered Jetomon.

"But we aren't children," Kali remarked. "We are adults. I mean we aren't adults like the ones that are working all of the computer stuff that would affect the digital world, but we are adults."

"That's true," Tigemon replied. "As far as I know, this is entirely unprecedented. If you are indeed destined children, you are much older than any other destined children before."

"Hey," Knifemon interrupted from on top of Jetomon's head. "The house is right over there."

Across the field there was a small grey house with no windows. It was so plain it looked like it could have been made of stone. When we reached the house, I opened the door and stepped inside. The inside was like the outside: plain and grey. Everybody else filed into the house behind me.

"Nice place she's got here," I remarked. I walked into another room and looked around. There was a table, a chair, and two blankets. One blanket large enough for a human and was lying on the floor. The other was much smaller and sat on the table.

"This is my apartment," explained Kali, "stripped down to nothing but walls and a front door. And my desk and chair."

"Well, we've got a long time to wait until night fall," Tank said. "Anybody have any ideas on what we can do to pass the time?"

Kali began rooting around in her bag. She pulled out a large stack of cards. "Anybody ever have a tarot reading?"

Sometimes she pulls the weirdest things out of her bag. I wonder what all she keeps in that thing. "No thanks hun, I'll just stick with my DS," I said as I pulled my Nintendo out of my pocket.

"I'm game," Tank said walking over to Kali and sitting down on the floor next to her. For the next hour or two we all just sat around the house waiting. I played my new Sonic the Hedgehog game on my DS, while Kali and Tank played with her tarot cards. Every once in a while, one of us would glance out the door, just out of boredom. It was usually me. It was getting about twilight the last time I looked out.

"When the heck is she coming back?" I asked, feeling the patience drain from my body.

Kali looked up from the cards. "Arkansas is an hour off from us, she may be used to staying up a little later. Just be patient and…"

A loud noise outside cut her off. We all went quiet, listening carefully. Was she back? If so, why was she making all this noise outside? After about a minute, there was another loud noise.

"I don't think that's a human," Jetomon said, quietly.

"Agreed," added Kali.

We all stood up and the six of us ran out the front door. There was a small Digimon that looked like a robot. It had three horns on its head and weird shapes on its arms. It was holding some large multicoloured gun in its hands. It aimed at the wall of the house and shouted, "Graffiti Rocket!" Paint shot out of the gun and splotched red paint all over the wall. In between the odd Digimon and us were large splotches of green and yellow paint.

"What the heck is that?" Tank asked quietly.

"And what the heck is it doing?" I added.

"It's endangering our mission is what it's doing," said Kali. She pulled out her computer and started typing. "It's called Omekamon. It's a champion level data type machine Digimon. Its special attack is Graffiti Rocket."

"Ummm… I think it just noticed us," Tank said. Sure enough, it had turned and was staring straight at us. And it looked angry. "You don't think it's going to attack us, do you?"

Unfortunately, we didn't get a chance to answer. "Omeka Kick" it yelled as it jumped and swung its leg at us. I dived toward Kali, knocking her out of the way. Its metal leg hit me in the side, knocking me into the side of the house. My side and back hurt really badly. I tried to stand back up, but I was in too much pain.

"Ryan!" Kali called out. My vision was a little blurred and I couldn't see her. I felt something grab me under the arms and lift me too my feet. As my vision began to clear, I saw that it was Tank. With his support, I walked back over to Kali.

"Are you okay? Don't scare me like that," she said, grabbing a hold of my hand. Tank was continued to support me, as he was stronger than Kali, but his attention was focused now on the other Digimon.

"We've got this!" yelled Knifemon.

"I'm going to get you for hurting my friend," said Jetomon with a snarl.

I could see well enough now to see Omekamon standing facing Knifemon, Jetomon, and Tigemon. Jetomon dashed forward and leapt into the air. "Sonic Boom!" The recoil canceled Jetomon's forward momentum and he landed on the ground where he had started. The shockwave hit Omekamon directly in the head. He didn't even try to dodge it. It just glanced off of him.

He pointed his gun at Jetomon. "Graffiti Rocket!" The blast of purple paint hit Jetomon and sent him spiraling backward toward the other two Digimon.

"Our turn," said Tigemon as he ran toward Omekamon. As he ran, the blades emerged from Knifemon's back.

"Kunai Storm!"

"Stars and Stripes"

Blades shot out of Knifemon in every direction, forcing us to duck for cover. A couple of the blades bounced off of Omekamon. Immediately after, Tigemon' leapt into the air with a spin, swinging his tail in a vicious attack. But Omekamon caught his tail in one hand, and after dangling him by the tail for a second, Omekamon threw him into the wall of the house. Tigemon slid down the wall, and landed in a lump on the ground. Omekamon pulled his gun back around from his back and fired at Knifemon. "Graffiti Rocket!" The blast hit Knifemon, covering her in blue paint. In a matter of moments, Omekamon had wiped out all three of our Digimon.

Jetomon was lying on the ground only a few feet from me. I reached my arm out toward him. "Jetomon…"

"Ryan, you're hurt. There's nothing you can do," Tank said, struggling to keep me where I was and on my feet. I kept stretching my arm out, reaching for something, anything that I could do to help Jetomon.

"I've got to help… Jetomon…" as I spoke, a light began to shine in front of me. It was warm and inviting. Whatever it was, it was what I was looking for. This light was what I needed in order to help.

"What is that?" Kali asked from behind me. The light was only a couple of inches away from me now. As I got closer to it, Jetomon began to glow as well; he let out a grunt, shook his head, and slowly climbed back to his feet. Tank, stunned by everything that was happening, dropped his arms, letting me go. I stumbled forward almost falling over but caught the light in my hand as I regained my balance. I looked at the strange light in my hand. It was becoming more concentrated until it finally turned into a small machine that looked like a handheld game or a pocket organizer. It was white and shaped like an upside-down egg. It had a small square screen at the top with a dark red circle around it and a large white button underneath with two smaller red buttons over it. It had a red strap coming off the top of it.

"What is this?" I asked.

"Ryan," Jetomon spoke, now back to his feet. "That thing is a Digivice. With that, you can help me Digivolve. Then I'll be strong enough to fight this guy.

"What do I do?" I asked. But as I asked, the screen began to glow and green letters appeared on the screen. "Di-gi-vo-lu-tion?" As I said the word on the screen, the Digivice began to glow again. This was it. It was time to put this Omekamon in its place, and I was going to do it. I gripped the Digivice firmly in my hand and held it out toward Jetomon. With all the resolution I could muster, I called out.

"Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Jetomon Digivolve to…"

Jetomon's body stretched out and grew to nearly three times his length. His claws grew much longer and his head stretched out, resembling a snake's head even more. His goggles tightened over his face until it looked like he had large lenses for eyes and a stripe around his head. The fangs in his mouth were longer now, and he looked much more vicious in general. The blade on his tail became serrated and a line of black spikes grew down the back of his neck. Finally, his normal dark brown skin tone turned to a deep red.

"Machdramon!"

"He changed!" Kali shouted from behind me. I heard her typing on her computer again. "That's Machdramon! He's a champion level virus type dragon Digimon, the evolved form of Jetomon. He can run at the speed of sound and can move on four legs or just two. His special attack is 'Sonic Disruption'. He can beat Omekamon!"

"Are you ready, Machdramon?"

Machdramon had an evil grin on his face as he replied to my question. "He won't know what hit him…" His voice was deeper and had a noticeable hiss to it.

Omekamon lunged at Machdramon with blinding speed and yelled, "Omeka Kick!" But Machdramon was already gone. Now he was behind Omekamon. Omekamon turned around and jumped at Machdramon again, but again Machdramon dodged so quickly it was barely visible. Omekamon tried a third time, but once again, wasn't even close to hitting Machdramon. And this time Machdramon slashed Omekamon with his tail blade as he avoided the kick, sending Omekamon flying into the house, busting a large hole in the wall. Jetomon dashed into the house after Omekamon, grabbed him from the rubble and threw him out of the large whole and into the air. Without a second lost, Machdramon jumped after him, spun around and slashed him with his tail again, sending him careening into the ground. Machdramon landed on the other side of him about several yards away and waited.

Omekamon slowly climbed back to his feet, notably slower and weaker than before. He pulled out his gun and pointed it at Machdramon. "Graffiti Rocket!"

"Sonic Disruption!" A cone of warped space engulfed the projectile and disintegrated it. Omekamon was caught in it as well, and after a few seconds of resistance, he flew back toward the house with a scream, landing just a few feet from the broken wall. "Time to finish this," hissed Machdramon. "Sonic…"

"Dour Devour!"

"What the hell?" Kali yelled next to me. It wasn't Omekamon, and it wasn't Machdramon… where had the voice come from? A shadowy cloud emerged from Omekamon and sailed up into the air as if being pulled by some unknown force. It flew up onto the roof and into the open mouth of Salamon, the Digimon I saw the other day, who's eyes swirled with darkness before she shut them for a moment and when she opened them again, there was nothing remaining of the darkness. And standing next to Salamon was…

"Lily!"

To be continued…

More witches!

err... I mean, more author notes:

This chapter was getting too long... so I cut it a little short and left you all with a nice little cliffhanger. Enjoy.

I love Omekamon. He's one of my favorites and I knew I just had to use him for something.

Digivices for this story are essentially D-Powers (D-Arcs if you prefer) but more rounded, as there is no need for Digimodify (Card Slash). There are a couple reasons for this similarity. Number one, I like season 3 a lot. Other reasons...

I will not be describing the evolutions every time they evolve. Only the first time each Digimon evolves to a new form. So next time Jetomon evolves to Machdramon, I will not repeat my description, but when Machdramon evolves to his Ultimate form (Oh, what could it be??? Hahaha! You have to wait!) I will have a new description.

If you aren't getting confused yet... please be patient. We are, after all, just getting started here.

Oh, and on a side note, I am well aware that no Salamon has ever used a move called "Dour Devour". There's a reason for that. I made it up. Ok, there's another reason for that. Mabie... err, Maybe.


	6. Chapter 6: Stripes Are In

Disclaimer: yeah

Author notes: If the title doesn't give it away, this is Tank's second chapter

Severe appologies for the long wait. Pokemon Platinum devoured my soul. I'm slowly stealing small pieces of it back.

_Chapter 6_

_Stripes are In_

"Lily!"

There she was, standing on the roof of the house next to Salamon. There was still enough sunlight left in the sky to see her clearly. She was a few inches taller than Kali. She was wearing a pink blouse and a long silver skirt, both of which were covered in dirt. The bottom of her skirt was frayed and had several long tears in it. Her hair was tied back in a long ponytail with a long silver ribbon. It was likely part of her skirt. The ribbon came down as long as the ponytail on each side. As it swayed in the breeze, the words "Hope or Die!" could be seen written up and down the fabric.

"You attack this innocent creature as if it was the enemy?" she asked abruptly.

"It attacked us first," Machdramon hissed, still poised to deliver a final blow to the motionless Omekamon. "Besides, orders are orders." Orders? What was he talking about? Nobody had said anything about any orders.

Salamon stepped forward. "The Overmind is wrong. There is another way."

"Prove it!" Machdramon hissed.

"We just did," Lily said motioning back to Omekamon. Omekamon slowly stumbled back to his feet, an awkward task, given his body type. He still had an angry scowl on his face. Although, now that I looked at it, his face looked like it was painted on. Which would make sense, as he did look like a giant LEGO man.

"Owww… my head," as he spoke the threatening edge in his voice disappeared. "What happened?"

Lily spoke from atop the roof again, "You were infected. We just saved your life."

"Infected? And I'm still alive?" He sounded fearful. "Oh thank you, thank you all so very much. How can I ever repay you?"

"Try staying out of trouble," Salamon said. With that, Lily and salamon turned to walk away.

"Lily, wait!" Ryan yelled. He took a step forward, stumbling slightly from his injured side.

Lily stopped and turned back toward us. "I don't know how you know my name, and I don't really care."

"Lily, we just want to help," I offered.

"Salamon and I don't need help," she replied. "In fact, we seem to be doing better than the lot of you." She began stepping back again.

"You can't outrun me," Machdramon said, calmly.

"I don't need to out run you," she replied. "Your partner isn't going anywhere with that injury." Ryan was now sitting on the ground with his arms around his sides. He had taken a bad hit, but I wasn't sure how bad it was. "And don't be so naïve as to think that you are the only one who can Digivolve." Salamon looked up at her and the two turned and ran, leaping off the opposite side of the house and running into the woods.

Omekamon looked around at those of us that remained. "Hey! Wait for me!" he yelled and took off after Lily.

Machdramon turned his head back. "Ryan?"

"Let them go," Ryan said. Machdramon began to glow and then shrank back to Jetomon. He walked over to Ryan.

"Are you okay, Ryan?" Jetomon asked.

"I'll be fine. It will take a lot more than some tin man to put me down," Ryan responded with a pained grin.

"Well, that mission was a complete bust," I said.

Tigemon looked up at me. "I would have to agree, sir."

"Not necessarily, Tank," Kali began. "While I would agree that it could have gone better, it also raised many new questions. And with more questions comes more answers."

"Yes, but all the answers just ran off," I replied.

"Not true." I turned to Ryan who was struggling to get back to his feet. "Most of the answers just ran away, but not all of them. Jetomon, what are these 'orders'? You've mentioned them once before and again just now."

"The Overmind ordered that all Digimon showing irrational aggressiveness are to be reformatted," Jetomon said calmly.

"Destroyed," Tigemon said quietly. He sounded sad and looked as if he was off in thought.

Knifemon took over, "The theory is that by forcing the affected Digimon to reboot, whatever causes the aggression will get lost in the transition. When a Digimon reverts to an egg, data is lost. Presumably that data would be the first to disappear, as it is not natural data."

"That's terrible!" Kali exclaimed.

"Yes it is," Knifemon continued. "It's not even proven to work. Innocent Digimon could be destroyed for no reason. Putting aside the possibility of misunderstandings being misinterpreted as infection, there is still nothing to say that they might return just as bad or worse than before."

"There's no proof that it doesn't work, either," Jetomon replied.

"Just like a virus to take joy in any opportunity to destroy without provocation!" Knifemon yelled at him.

"I haven't seen any alternate ideas from any vaccines yet!" Jetomon retorted.

"Yeah, well…"

"Guys, stop it," I interjected. "Arguing it isn't going to get us anywhere. We have to work together. Jetomon is a virus. That's what he does. But he's on our side, so that's good enough for me. Besides, he just defended us from that machine Digimon. Knifemon, as a vaccine, you obviously don't like this order to destroy things without properly analyzing the problem and making the proper solution. There wasn't one before, but Lily has shown us something new. Perhaps now there is a better way. Knifemon, can you accept that Jetomon was just doing what he believed was the right thing to do?"

"Yes…"

"Jetomon, if we can figure out a way to emulate what Salamon did to save that Digimon, will you use it instead of destroying our would be enemies?"

"Yes…"

"Good problem solved." I looked down at Tigemon. He was still staring off into space. What could be bothering him?

"Well," Kali began, "The next question would logically be, what did Salamon do to save that Digimon? However, I don't think anybody knows that answer, correct?" Everybody shook their heads. "The new program I placed on Kamui does not list a 'Dour Devour' under Salamon's attacks, nor does it list it as any attack at all. According to this, it doesn't exist. So, we will have to continue to the next question."

"Who is the Overmind?" I asked.

"Indeed. Overmind is obviously not the name of a Digimon, as it lacks the usual suffix, although it could be a title given to a certain Digimon," Kali continued.

Knifemon looked up, "I've never seen the Overmind before."

"Very few digimon have," added Jetomon. "I'm certain he's a Digimon, but he doesn't show his face very often. The Overmind sets all of the rules for this sector of the Digital world. He's appointed by the Digimon sovereign, who is in charge of the entire western hemisphere."

"Supposedly appointed," Tigemon corrected.

"Is his authority in question?" I asked.

"Well," Knifemon replied, "his recent actions are rather odd. Mainly, the proclamation that we just finished talking about. Also, Overminds are usually public figures. The fact that this one stays hidden worries many Digimon."

"Can we talk directly to this, Digimon sovereign?" Ryan asked.

"Generally, only the Overminds talk to the sovereign," Jetomon answered. "Although there is also a rumor that he has gone missing. Although if no one ever sees him, how do they know he's missing? Seems like a rumor that was just started due to the odd actions of the Overmind. Either way, I don't know how to find him, and I doubt anyone else here knows," he said looking at Knifemon, who shook her head, and then Tigemon, who stayed quiet for a few seconds before shaking his head as well.

"Does anybody know where to find this Overmind?" Kali asked. The Digimon all shook their heads again. "Then it seems that we're out of ideas at the moment. I think now would be an opportune time to call it a night. It's getting rather late. Shall we head home?" I nodded in agreement.

"I'm not going," replied Ryan.

"Ryan, we can continue this another day, but for now, it's late, and we have no direction. Let's just go home," Kali said.

"I can't go," Ryan replied again.

"Ryan…" Kali began.

"That's not it…" I said. I hadn't realized it before now. But Ryan was right. He couldn't go home. "You can't run, can you?"

Kali's eyes shot wide open. She figured it out as well. Ryan gave a weak smile. "I can barely stand."

"Let me take a look," I said. I walked over to Ryan and with one hand lifted his shirt up, exposing his side. The skin was dark. It had already bruised. Ryan tried to look tough, but I could see he was in a lot of pain. He needed to see a doctor for this, but without being able to get back to our world, there was no way to get him to a doctor. I released his shirt and it fell back over his torso. "It looks pretty bad. Without a doctor, it could take a while to heal." I looked over to the Digimon. "Would you guys keep an eye on him for a while. Make sure nothing bad happens to him. Make sure he doesn't do anything stupid, either." They nodded in agreement. I stood up and began to walk toward Kali. "C'mon, he'll be fine. We need to get back. We have school in the morning."

Kali stayed where she was. "Tigemon, why don't you go home with Tank? I'll help keep an eye on Ryan. After all, if it weren't for him, it would be me that was all banged up. He saved me." Tigemon nodded and then walked to me.

"Alright, I'll run by your professors and see if there's any work you need picked up. I'll figure out what to tell them at some point. Goodnight you two. Be safe," I added with a smile. I don't know if either of them caught the double entendre. It was funny to me.

School the next day was fairly uneventful. I went to all of my classes, and in between, met with all of Ryan and Kali's instructors to pick up any assignments they might be missing. Good thing I suggested that we trade schedules in case something like this occurred. I told their instructors that Ryan had gotten injured and Kali was staying with him at the hospital. All true, except for the hospital.

After classes were out, I started heading home. The parking garage was two buildings over. Directly ahead of me were a guy and a girl holding hands. They seemed an odd couple. The girl was sort of pretty, long blond hair, white t-shirt, blue jeans. The guy on the other hand, was heavily pierced, wearing a shirt that was too small for him, and his pants sagged about six inches, showing red and white checkered boxers. I honestly didn't understand how anybody could find that attractive in the slightest. I was grateful when they turned and started heading another direction before we got to the parking garage. I was sick of looking at them.

Ryan and Kali were at least a decent looking pair. Kali had a bit of the gothic thing going, but was otherwise rather pretty. Ryan was a good-looking guy, athletic and active. He dressed casual, but sensibly, other than that shirt with the torn off sleeve that he always wore. It was a shame that he seemed to lack the motivation to do anything with his life. Hopefully this situation in the digital world would help to spark something inside him. A lot of his instructors seemed unconvinced that he would actually get any of the work done that I was bringing him. It must be nice to know that someone out there loves you despite your flaws.

Traffic was backed up really bad. Some sort of accident, or construction, or something. As I slowly made my way across through, I noticed a large crowd of people gathered on the side of the road. There was a lot of commotion, although my car was low enough that I couldn't see over the people. I ignored the crowd and continued the extra block to my apartment. As I stepped out of my car, several people ran by headed for the crowd.

"Did you hear?" one asked the others. "Apparently some guy crashed his car into some ones house during the night. The car is gone and nobody saw it happen, but there's a huge hole in the wall."

"I heard some gang spray painted all over the house as well, do you think they're related?" another one asked.

No… freaking… way… That house in the digital world. Omekamon had shot paint all over it. And then Machdramon and Omekamon destroyed a large section of the wall during their fight. Come to think of it, I seemed to recall Kali mentioning something about it being similar to her apartment, which was a block down the street… where the large crowd was gathered. I dashed into our apartment, threw my book bag into my room, grabbed the digital camera that my parents had gotten me for my birthday last year, and headed back out. I ran down the block to where the crowd was gathered. I fought through the people until I got a good sight of the building. It was Kali's apartment, and it looked just like the one in the digital world. Covered in paint and a giant hole in the wall. Nothing good could come of this. I snapped a couple of pictures, and went back to the apartment.

"Tigemon?" I called out when I got back into the room. The basket of laundry in my room began to shake, until Tigemon emerged from underneath several shirts.

"Sir?" he replied, jumping out of the basket.

"You sleep in my laundry? Oh, never mind. We need to get back to the digital world. I have something important to bring up with the rest of the group."

Tigemon smiled. "Yes sir." At least his mood seemed to have improved from yesterday.

I grabbed my canteen and my binoculars, stuffed them into the pockets of my denim jacket, and got ready to transfer. I had finally begun to get used to doing martial arts next to a baby tiger that was mimicking my movements, at least as well as a quadruped could perform them. It was an odd sight. But after the first couple stances, the room began to morph. After a minute or so of continued concentration and training, there was nothing left of the apartment. We were back in the digital world. I was a little afraid to find out what would happen if I stopped part way through. I made it a goal to never find out.

I was standing just outside the house. We were beginning to believe that you could choose where you ended up by thinking about a specific location. It seemed to fit, considering the first time, I wanted to be in an isolated place away from commotion, and I ended up on a mountain. And the times since, we all decided to meet in the plain near the mountain, and that's where we would all transport. This time, the house was my desired location, and here I was, an arm's reach from the door.

I looked to the side to confirm that Tigemon had made it with me, and then reached forward and opened the door. Kali was sitting on the floor in the entrance room with a towel laid out at her feet. She was making sandwiches. Knifemon was standing next to her watching.

"Hi Tank, school out already?"

"Yeah. I've got Ryan's homework at the apartment. All of your instructors just said to not worry about it. They'll fill you in when you get back."

"Yeah, that's what I figured." She turned to Knifemon. "I need another one, please."

Knifemon closed her eyes and appeared to be concentrating really hard. "Kunai… Storm…" A single knife shot out of the center of her body straight up and stuck into the ceiling. Kali got to her feet, reached up, and pulled the knife out. She sat back down, wiped the knife with the towel, and used it to spread mayo and mustard on the sandwiches.

"Are you sure that's sanitary?" I asked. "That knife just came out of her body."

"She's a machine type Digimon, no organics, just metal, and such. Besides, I wiped it off."

"Germ free!" Knifemon replied gleefully. "Although, I still don't know what a germ is."

"This is the digital world, Tank. There may not even be germs here." Kali explained.

"Well, I have another good reason that you should probably quit doing that. Where's Ryan, he's going to want to hear this."

"He and Jetomon are in the other room with Kamui," Knifemon said.

I stepped into the room that would be Kali's room in her real apartment. Ryan was sitting in a chair at the desk playing a game on Kali's computer. Jetomon was standing next to him watching. There were bandages around Ryan's waist. Kali had done a good job after I left. I walked over and stood next to him, opposite of Jetomon.

"How're the ribs?" I asked.

"Painful," he replied, not taking his eyes off the computer game. "I miss my video games. After I beat my Sonic game, there was nothing left to do on the DS. Should have brought more games."

Kali walked into the room carrying a stack of sandwiches. Knifemon tailed behind her. "Five sandwiches?" I asked.

"Knifemon is a machine type. She doesn't eat," Kali explained. "I did offer, though."

"Solar powered!" Knifemon replied.

"That's just weird," Ryan said, taking one of the sandwiches off the stack. Knifemon glared at him.

"Well, now that we're all here," I said, reaching into my pocket and pulling out my digital camera. I loaded the picture on the screen on the back and showed it to them. "I thought this might be of interest to you guys."

"Aww, you took a picture of my new home," Ryan said as he noticed the hole in the wall and the paint everywhere.

"Not quite, look closer," I said.

Kali's eyes got wide. "Is that police tape at the bottom of the picture?"

"Yeah, and that blur at the bottom is somebody's head. This is your apartment in the real world," I explained.

"How in the hell did this happen?" Ryan asked.

"It would appear that our actions in this world can have a direct influence on the real world," Kali observed. "At least for structures that appear the same in both. Similarly, if our clothes are damaged here, they stay damaged when we go back."

"But we take our clothes with us," Ryan replied. "Your apartment is still there."

"Our clothes are much smaller, too," Kali responded. "A building may be too large to make the trip across, so instead the building was cloned. Either way, the two seem linked, physically. We should leave this building alone, along with any other structures that seem similar to structures in the real world."

"And avoid punching holes in the ceiling," I said with a grin.

"Yeah, no more holes in the ceiling," Kali agreed.

"Alright, let's pack our gear and get moving," said Ryan as he stood up from his chair. He winced in pain as he turned around.

Kali put a hand on his shoulder. "Dear, let us pack the gear."

"Just stay put and try not to hurt yourself," I added, with a grin.

It only took a couple of minutes to get all of Kali's gear together. She packs a lot of stuff, but it is good that she's so prepared. Ryan's injury could have been much worse had she not been able to treat it.

Once everything was together, we left the house through the giant hole in the wall and headed into the forest behind it. "So, where are we going now?" Ryan asked. "I've never been in the back of the party and I don't really know what to do."

"You stand around and cast spells," I replied.

"You're so funny. Does that make you the meat shield?"

"I suppose it might. If you recall, we're still trying to find Lily. Our last encounter wasn't as smooth as we had hoped it would be," I explained.

"Ok, but last time we also knew where to look. Today, we have no idea where she is, but we can probably count on her not going back to the house."

"Another good reason to not stay there," Kali continued. "It has exhausted its use for our mission."

"Last we saw, she was headed into the woods behind the house. So, we're here searching the woods," I suggested.

"Sadly, that is our best plan of action at the moment," Kali replied.

"Oh great," Ryan said, sarcastically. "What are we going to do, walk around calling her name? If she doesn't want to be around us, then she's going to stay the heck away from us, and three people with associated critters do not make a very stealthy task force."

"Well…" I thought to my self for a few seconds. "We could try calling wolf. If she thinks we're in danger, she might come to help."

"Your crib was painted with lead paint, wasn't it," Ryan asked.

"Ya know, I don't hear any ideas coming from you," I retorted. There was a long pause before Ryan said anything else.

"Hey, I uh… think I just found out what the guy in the back of the party is supposed to do. What if we actually were in danger instead of just pretending?"

"Honey," Kali replied. "With all due respect, have you lost your mind?"

"Nah, I'm just saying that there is a large angry looking lion behind us that might qualify for actual danger."

"Do what?" I said, spinning around. Holy crap. He was right. There was a large bipedal lion about twenty feet behind us. It didn't look happy.

"Umm… Kali?" I asked. "Analysis?"

"Leomon!" Tigemon yelled as Kali attempted to get her computer ready.

"That works for now," I responded. "Friend or foe?"

"Usually friend," Jetomon replied. "Although he doesn't look too friendly right now."

Kali had finally gotten her computer ready. "Leomon: vaccine type beast Digimon. Champion level. Special attack is 'Fist of the Beast King'."

"Why isn't he moving?" I asked.

"Leomon has a strong code of honor," Tigemon explained. "Maybe his code is so strong that even the corruption can't alter it. In that case, evil or not, he wouldn't allow himself to initiate a fight."

"If he's looking for someone to make the first move, then I'd be happy to be of service!" Jetomon exclaimed, running toward Leomon.

"Jetomon! Wait! Ow!" Ryan started to run after him, but after two steps fell to the ground clutching his side. Jetomon jumped into the air and shouted his attack.

"Sonic Boom!" The attack hit Leomon directly in the face, but it left little more than a skuff. Leomon grinned and slowly began pulling a sword from behind his back.

"Too late now…" I said.

"Damnit," Ryan said, climbing back to his feet. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the digivice he had gotten the day before. He held it out at arm's length, pointing it at Jetomon. "Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Jetomon Digivolve to… Machdramon!"

Kali stepped forward. "Knifemon, lend him some support." Knifemon ran forward and joined the fray.

"Tigemon?" I asked. "I suppose you should probably get in there as well." He didn't move.

"Sir…" he said quietly. "I can't hurt Leomon. He's a good Digimon that has become victim of something out of his control. It's not his fault."

The battle was not looking good. As fast as Machdramon may have been, Leomon was always one step ahead of him. Every move Machdramon attempted to make just ended in him flying the other direction. And Knifemon was just launching knives every direction, missing everything but the trees.

Maybe I could reason with Tigemon. "I respect your stance on that, but we need to protect ourselves. Machdramon and Knifemon are fighting as hard as they can, not because they want to hurt Leomon, but because if they don't fight, Leomon will probably kill us. It's self defense."

"I refuse to destroy an innocent Digimon," Tigemon responded.

"You don't have to," I replied. He perked his ears up. "Lily should be somewhere near by. All you have to do is stall him until we can get Lily here. She can cure him."

He looked down for a few seconds and then looked at Machdramon and Knifemon as they fought against Leomon. They weren't going to last much longer. "I'll stall him," he finally muttered, taking a few steps forward.

"Thank you, Tigemon," I said. "I hope you know, I would never force you to do something that was against your code of honor."

Tigemon turned his head back and smiled at me. "Thank you, sir."

A bright light suddenly appeared in front of me. I had seen this light before. As I reached out to grab it, the light faded. "A Digivice…" It looked just like Ryan's only green with orange buttons. I couldn't help but stare at it. It was not only beautiful in its own way, but it also seemed to fill my body with power and confidence. I felt like I could do anything with this in my possession.

"Don't just stand there, sir," Tigemon said. "If we've got new power, then let us put it to use!"

"Agreed!" I thrust the digivice forward. "Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

Tigemon Digivolve to…

Tigemon's body grew to several times its original size and switched to an upright stance. Long blonde hair began to grow from the back of his head and tied itself back into a shoulder length ponytail. Muscle definition began to appear all over his body, as his tail grew longer and narrower like a regular tiger's tail. A pair of baggy green pants slid over his legs and around his waist, followed by a white tunic over his torso. He let out a loud roar as a long staff fell from the sky and landed in the palm of his hand. He spun the staff around his body several times before slamming it into the ground and then returning to his standing position with his staff at his side.

"Khanemon!"

"Another evolution!" Kali proclaimed, typing into her keyboard. "Khanemon: Data type beast Digimon. Champion level. Special attack is 'Seismic Slam'. He might be able to turn this fight around."

"Seismic Slam!" Khanemon jumped into the air and slammed down on the ground causing a massive shockwave between Leomon and Machdramon, blowing both Digimon away from each other. Machdramon quickly resumed his position and stood next to Khanemon.

"All right," Machdramon hissed. "Together we can take this guy down."

"No!" Khanemon proclaimed. "I'll hold him off. You are going to go find Lily."

"What? You need my help!"

"No, Leomon needs your help. I will not reformat an innocent Digimon. You can run at the speed of sound. Find Lily and bring her here."

Machdramon glared at Khanemon. "Grrrrrr… fine!" He turned around and ran back to Ryan. "C'mon, we're gonna go find Lily."

"Are you sure it's a good idea to bring me along?" Ryan asked. "I'm not exactly in the best condition for high speed travel."

"Two against one isn't good odds," Machdramon hissed. "And to be perfectly honest, I don't think this Lily or her Salamon like me very much." Machdramon seemed to be picking up a lot of Ryan's sarcasm… for better or worse.

"I can't imagine why," Ryan remarked. "You're such a swell guy." Ryan climbed on Machdramon's back and they darted off deeper into the forest. Leomon crouched down and then jumped high into the air after them.

"Khanemon!" I called.

"Fist of the…"

"Seismic Slam!" Khanemon leapt up even faster than Leomon and swung his staff, landing a direct hit and sending Leomon spiraling back to the ground.

"Good work!" I yelled to Khanemon.

Leomon slowly got back to his feet and snarled at Khanemon.

Khanemon waved his finger side to side. "You're fighting me now, not them."

To be continued…

Author notes: May as well start mentioning where names for the digimon come from. Jetomon... as in he jets around. Knifemon... can't remember. Tigemon... is he the tiger? Machdramon... Mach=speed of sound. Khanemon... Khan means tiger, somewhere... watch Jungle Book.

Next chapter won't take nearly as long to finish (hopefully).

Too tired for funny nonsense... pretend I'm funny... please? good


	7. Chapter 7: Bad Luck

Author Notes: Ok, I'm really really sorry... I know it's been about a year since the last time I posted a chapter... so much has gone on, I just couldn't do it... but all that's behind me now. Digimon Legend is officially back on track.

This chapter starts at the exact same time and place as the previous chapter did... only from a different perspective.

Now I'll leave you to the new chapter. I hope you enjoy it and can forgive me for the excessive delay...

Chapter 7

Bad Luck

"Lily!"

It was them again. I hadn't seen them in… well, I had lost track of time, but I knew it had been several days at least. I thought maybe they had wandered to a different area of the Digital world, but here they were again. Where had they been all this time? They were the only other humans I had seen in the Digital world. I was sure I would have bumped into them several times by now if they were staying nearby.

I looked down from my perch on the roof at what was left of the battle. I could hardly believe that such a defenseless Digimon could be attacked like this, though I had seen it many times. It had to stop. I had to stop it. The other Digimon I could understand, but humans as well? Why would they do this?

"You attack this innocent creature as if it was the enemy?" I asked.

The dinosaur Digimon still focused on the small machine Digimon replied. "It attacked us first!" it hissed. This must have been the Digivolved form of the small reptile we saw before. How had it Digivolved already? Could the other two Digivolve as well? "Besides, orders are orders." Why do they follow these orders so blindly?

"The Overmind is wrong," Salamon said. "There is another way."

"Prove it!" the lizard hissed back.

"We just did," I replied, motioning to the Digimon lying on the ground. As everyone turned to look, it began to climb back to its feet. It looked like it was going to be ok.

"Owww… my head," it said as it began to look around. "What happened?"

"You were infected. We just saved your life," I told the confused Digimon. As usual, the infected Digimon has no memory of what happened during that time. Poor thing…

"Infected?" it cried out. The Digimon was now shaking in fear. "And I'm still alive? Oh thank you, thank you all so very much! How can I ever repay you?" he asked.

"Try to stay out of trouble," I said. I turned and started heading for the other side of the roof.

"Lily, wait!" a voice shouted behind me.

I stopped and turned around. I really didn't feel like playing twenty questions with these guys. "I don't know how you know my name, and I don't really care."

"Lily, we just want to help," offered the taller boy. Help? Was he joking? Why on earth would I need their help?

"Salamon and I don't need help," I responded. "In fact, we seem to be doing better than the lot of you," I added as I turned away again.

"You can't outrun me," hissed the dinosaur Digimon.

I turned my head to look over my shoulder. "I don't need to outrun you. Your partner isn't going anywhere with that injury. And don't be so naive as to think that you are the only one who can Digivolve." Salamon turned to look at me and I gave her a small wink. I ran to the opposite side of the roof and jumped off, landing with a roll. Salamon followed as I took off into the woods.

"Hey! Wait for me!" the machine Digimon shouted from behind us. A tag along was the last thing I wanted right now. After making certain that we were far enough out of sight, I grabbed onto a tree branch and lifted myself up. Salamon and I climbed several branches up and then watched as the machine Digimon we had saved earlier ran by underneath us, still shouting for us to wait. Finally, he was gone, and Salamon and I were alone again.

"Why did you lie to them?" Salamon asked once the coast was clear. "About me being able to Digivolve? I haven't Digivolved yet, Lily."

I looked up through the tree tops. It was getting dark. "To give them another reason to not follow us. Besides, it's only a matter of time." I thought about all that had happened over the past few days. It seemed like my normal life was ages ago. "Let's sleep here tonight," I said, leaning up against the trunk of the tree. Salamon nodded. She walked across the limb to me and curled up in my lap, closing her eyes. She was sleeping peacefully in only a few minutes.

Sleep avoided me for a few hours. Thoughts circled in my head. Where was I, really? What are Digimon? Why had Salamon not Digivolved yet? Who were those other humans? Had they been here as long as I had? Longer? Would I ever find my way home?

Eventually, I found rest. I dreamed of my family. Of my friends. All the people I had left back at home. All of them leaving. I was all alone. No mother. No father. No brothers or sisters. Not even one single friend. Just me and Sala... Sala... who was I thinking about? Whoever it was, they weren't here. It was really just me. Alone in the darkness. It got darker and darker. The silence was painful. I screamed for someone, anyone, to come help me. But I had no voice. There was no sound at all, save the distant noise of the waves. Waves?

In the morning, I awoke to a strange noise. Far in the distance, I could barely make it out. A bell? It rang a few times, and then was quiet. It must have been miles away. Was that the noise I had heard in my dream. More like a nightmare. Or was it? My memory of the dream was fading quickly.

"Did you hear that, Salamon?" I asked?

Still sitting in my lap, Salamon looked up at me. "Yes, but I've never heard any noise like that before." I faintly recognized the sound of the bell, but I couldn't quite place what it was from. It had definitely made me curious though.

"Wanna go investigate it?" I asked.

"Sure," she replied. "But, I couldn't tell what direction it was coming from." Neither could I. It must have been echoing off of the trees.

"Well, there's no point in staying up here all day," I said as I began to climb down the limbs of the tree. When I reached the bottom limb, a strong gust of wind knocked me off my balance. "Whoa! Salamon!" I cried as the wind picked up stronger and I fell off the branch.

~doko desu ka~

I slammed onto my back on the ground. "Ow…" Did I hear a voice in the wind? Salamon jumped down next to me.

"Are you ok?" she asked, worried.

I slowly climbed to my feet. "Yeah, I'm fine. Did you hear a voice when I fell, Salamon?"

"I dunno," she replied. "I could barely hear your scream through the noise of the wind in the trees." Maybe I had just imagined it. Even if it was a voice, I couldn't understand what it was saying. It just sounded like gibberish. "Hey, Lily, was that there before?"

I looked at Salamon and followed her gaze about twenty feet away. "A scarecrow?" I said, puzzled. It certainly looked like a scarecrow. It had a broad brimmed hat with a light on the front and matching brown gloves and boots. It wore a green tunic and large amounts of straw were sticking out of various patches and joints. A bow and quiver of arrows was visible sticking out from behind its back. A black bird flew down and landed on its right shoulder, pecked at it's yellow hair a few times, and then flew off again. It appeared the scarecrow was doing a rather poor job of scaring crows.

"Who puts a scarecrow in the middle of a forest?" Filled with curiosity, Salamon and I began to walk slowly towards the scarecrow. A gentle breeze came winding through the trees, carrying a blanket of leaves with it, as I finally stood face to face with the scarecrow. All of its facial features appeared to have been drawn by hand with a broad marker. I slowly reached out with my left hand. Inches from one of the scarecrows eyes, the wind picked back up and blew so hard I almost fell over. I had to shield my eyes from the debris that came whipping up with it. I heard Salamon yell as she tumbled backward several yards.

~umi~

There was that voice on the wind again. I still couldn't make out any words though. When the wind finally died, I removed my hands from over my eyes, but the scarecrow was gone. I turned and looked all around, but I couldn't see it anywhere. Salamon stood back up and started walking back to me. "Where did it go, Lily?" I was at a loss.

"I dunno. Could it have been a Digimon?" I asked.

Salamon did what I could only guess was a shrug. "I've never seen any Digimon like that before." It did appear very strange, but there seemed to be no other explanation for its sudden disappearance. After all, normal scarecrows don't walk around whispering in peoples' ears.

I shook my head. "Whatever, let's just get out of these woods." I looked around. "Eh, let's go that way," I said, pointing off to my right. It was as good a direction as any. I had no idea what direction the bell was or what direction the scarecrow went. It was, however, the direction that the strong gusts of wind had been blowing. So perhaps that was the direction that the scarecrow had gone. It was at least worth a shot, if nothing else. I started walking with Salamon at my side.

"Lily, why are you avoiding the other humans? Don't you think it would be better to join with them and work together?"

"You saw them attacking that other Digimon," I replied. "They were going to destroy it."

"But Omekamon did attack them first. And they didn't know about the shadow that was controlling him. It was just a misunderstanding. I'm sure if they knew, they wouldn't have been so aggressive against him."

"Hmph. Ignorance is no excuse. I don't need them anyway. They don't have anything that I don't."

"Except clean clothes," Salamon said. Clean clothes? I froze. Clothes. All three of them were wearing different clothing yesterday than they were the first time I saw them. But how was that possible? Could it be? Did they find a way home? But how? I had looked everywhere. How could they have found a way back and not me? How could they have found a portal home?

They said they wanted to help me. Maybe they knew I was trying to find a way home and they were trying to help me. Home. All I want to do is go home. But I can't ask them for help. I have to do this on my own. For once in my life, I will do something on my own. Without any help from anyone else.

"Lily, are you ok?" Salamon asked from a few yards ahead, breaking me from my thoughts.

I shook my head and shrugged. "Yeah, let's just keep going. We're almost out of here.

A few minutes later, we emerged from forest into a large clearing. "Where to now, Lily?"

"Let's keep going this way," I replied. "Those strong gusts of winds were blowing this direction. So the scarecrow may have gone this way, and we still have no idea which direction the sound of that bell is coming from."

We continued walking for hours. I didn't mind that we were going so far away. I needed to find a new place to set up camp anyway. The others had found where I was staying, and in their battle with Omekamon, had destroyed one of the walls. It was time to find new shelter.

After several hours, we decided to stop for a while and rest. Salamon went out to find some food for us to eat. She knew what berries and plants were safe to eat. I had no idea, as they were all plants that I had never seen before. Once she had disappeared over the nearby hill, I returned to my thoughts.

It had been only a few days since I had arrived in the Digital world. Even though it hadn't been that long, much of my memory of the first couple days was blurry, likely due to stress. I remember showing up, finding Salamon, running into the other humans, and going to sleep that night. At some point between then and yesterday morning, we found out about the Overmind and his ruling that aggressive Digimon should be reformatted. And that Salamon had the ability to remove the cause of that aggressive behavior without reformatting the Digimon. And that the other humans were enforcing the Overmind's regulation. I couldn't remember how we got this information, but so far it seemed to be accurate.

Of course, there was always another explanation for all of this. Maybe this was all a dream. That too would explain my difficulty remembering events of the last few days. A complete fantasy land devoid of civilization. Filled with a large variety of creatures that weren't real. Maybe that bell was my alarm clock, and once I found the source in my dream, I would wake up. Then this would all be over. I could finally say goodbye to this Digital nightmare. To this whole Digital world. To Salamon. Salamon...

Ignoring the dream possibility for a while, Salamon brings up another problem. Why was Salamon not able to Digivolve yet? That other human's Digimon had Digivolved just yesterday, but Salamon hadn't yet, despite all of the Digimon that we had fought while saving them from the dark shadows. If she could Digivolve, it would certainly make everything a lot easier.

I heard Salamon's voice in the distance. She must have been returning with food. She was talking to someone. I stood up to get a better look, but I still couldn't see over the hill. I could barely make out her words. And I couldn't hear who she was talking to at all.

"Don't know what they're up to..."

"Yeah, that's what we were told, but..."

"I dunno, I'm just not sure anymore..."

"Something is different. Something has changed..."

"I dunno, we'll figure something out..."

There was a few minutes of silence and then Salamon came walking over the crest of the hill holding a bag made of large leaves in her mouth. I kept looking, but saw no one else come over the hill. Human, Digimon, or otherwise. She walked next to where I was standing and set the bag down on the ground. The bag unfolded to reveal a large supply of various berries and nuts.

"Who were you talking to, Salamon?" I asked, sitting back down.

"Huh?" she replied, cocking her head to the side. "Oh, ummm... just a friend. He left though. Kinda shy."

"Oh, that's too bad," I said. "I would have liked to have met your friend. You'll have to introduce me to him sometime."

"Yeah, no problem. Well, let's eat."

After eating the food, we set out again. Apart from this morning, it had been a rather uneventful day. Which did seem rather odd. Not that we weren't appreciative of the quiet walk through the gently rolling hills. It was quite relaxing. But I did find myself wondering where all of the other Digimon could have been. Usually if you walk for five minutes, you'll see at least five Digimon. We had been walking since this morning, and aside from the possibility of the scarecrow being a Digimon, we hadn't seen even one. This might also be worth investigating.

My thoughts were interrupted by a loud noise. The bell was ringing again. And this time, it was close. Just off to the right. Salamon and I looked at each other and quickly took off in the direction that the sound of the bell was coming from.

As we ran over the top of a hill, a large lake came into view, and just as the bell rang for the last time, I saw the tower come into view. A large bell tower that sat in the middle of the lake. But there was something off. I knew this bell tower. It was only a few miles from my house in the real world. But it was around other buildings, and definitely not in the middle of a lake. What's going on? Every day, this place gets more confusing.

"Damnit!" I yelled, dropping to my knees.

"Lily, what's wrong?" Salamon asked, looking concerned.

What does this mean? Why is this here? I don't understand. I let out a sigh. "It's nothing, Salamon. Don't worry about it."

Salamon nuzzled her head against my leg. "Lily, I..."

"Lily!" A shout rang out from behind us. A voice that I recognized. I turned around to see one of the boys from yesterday riding atop the dinosaur Digimon. They were approaching quickly. Very quickly. There was no way to get away from them this time. Just what this day needed to get even worse. As they came skidding to a halt, I rose to my feet.

"Finally," the boy said. "We've been looking all over for you."

"What do you want? I already told you I don't need your help," I said, glaring up at the boy.

"Leomon attacked us in the woods. We think whatever was controlling Omekamon is also controlling him, but we don't know how to get it out. My friends are holding him off right now, but we need your help to get rid of the evil shadow thing. Will you please help us?"

I couldn't believe it. Salamon was right. They just didn't know about the shadows. And what's more, they wanted me to help them. To help Leomon. They weren't trying to hurt the Digimon, they wanted me to help them remove the shadow from him without hurting him. Maybe they weren't so bad after all.

"This isn't some kind of trick, is it?" I asked, still cautious.

"What reason do I have to trick you?" he asked in return. Good question. Now that he had mentioned it, I could hardly think of why I was so defensive around them in the first place. But something still felt wrong. I just couldn't quite put my finger on what.

Salamon brushed my leg with her head. "Let's help them, Lily. Leomon is a nice kind Digimon, and I'd hate to leave him like that."

She was right. My uneasy feeling was unnecessary. The information we had about the other humans seemed to be wrong now. I couldn't even remember how we got that information, so there seemed to be little reason to follow it blindly. The least I could do is actually confirm it with my own eyes. And this would allow me to do just that. Leomon and the other humans both needed my help right now. It was go time.

"Alright, let's do it," I said, taking a step toward the human and his Digimon.

"Great," He said, holding down a hand. "Climb on."

I took his hand and sat down behind him. Salamon jumped up and sat down in my lap. "How far away are they?" I asked.

"Several miles," he replied. "Hold on tight, and try not to swallow any Flymon." With that, the Digimon broke into a run. The speed was unbelievable. We must have been going over a hundred miles per hour.

"I think we got off on the wrong foot the other day," He shouted over the wind. "My name's Ryan. This is Machdramon."

"I'm Lily," I shouted back.

"Lily Hope, I know. We saw you on the news the other day. Your parents are worried sick about you. We figured you didn't know how to get home. That's what we were trying to tell you yesterday."

"You can get me back home?" I asked.

"Yeah, no problem," he replied instantly.

"Why would you help me? After the way I treated you all yesterday, why?"

"Cause friends help each other out. Especially when they're in trouble."

Friends. I all but hated those three, and they think of me as their friend. I wanted nothing to do with them, and they were doing everything they could to help me. "Some friend I am," I said, looking down at Salamon.

She looked back up at me. "It's never too late to be a good friend, Lily."

Suddenly there was a bright light blinding me. As I tried to adjust my eyes, I noticed the light getting more concentrated around its source. It was coming from the palm of my hand. In just a few seconds it had condensed into a small bright light, which began to take shape and become a physical object. It looked like a small electronic device of some sort, like an MP3 player. The screen was glowing and displayed the message "DIGIVOLUTION". I remembered seeing one of these being held by Ryan yesterday. Only this one was pink on gray instead of red on white.

"Lily!" Salamon cried out. "That's a Digivice! With that, I can Digivolve!"

"And the timing couldn't be better," Ryan said from in front of me. "We're here. And it looks like Khanemon is getting worn out holding him off." In all the excitement of getting the Digivice, I hadn't even noticed that we had arrived back in the forest where we left this morning. And up ahead, two Digimon were fighting each other. A bipedal lion and a bipedal tiger with pants. A small distance behind the tiger, was a human holding another Digivice. I remembered him standing next to a small tiger Digimon yesterday. The large tiger Digimon must have been Khanemon, his evolution. Leaving the lion to be Leomon.

"Time to break that new toy in, Lily!" Ryan said, jumping off of Machdramon. Salamon and I jumped off as well, and Machdramon began to glow brightly and shrink back into his smaller form.

"Salamon, are you ready?" I said, looking down at her.

"Let's do it," she replied. I reached my arm out forward, holding the Digivice out.

"Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Salamon Digivolve to..."

Salamon's body realigned itself to stand upright, and long claws emerged from it's paws. Its head began to change from that of a small puppy to the head of a long eared cat. Her tail stretched out long and tufts of fur sprouted from the tip of her tail and ears. Her eyes turned a deep yellow and her fur turned black, except for a couple of stripes on her tail and the tufts of fur, which turned dark purple. The gold ring around her neck turned dark and shattered, and purple gloves with red marks slid over her front paws.

"Gatomon!"

"Alright Gatomon, we've got to save Leomon. You know what to do," I said.

Gatomon ran forward and leapt into the air. Just as Leomon was pulling back to throw an attack at Khanemon, Gatomon interrupted.

"Thunder Paw!" she shouted as she slashed her claws across Leomon's face. Leomon growled and staggered backward, clutching his face.

"Thanks, Gatomon," Khanemon said.

"My pleasure," she replied. "He's about to regret ever crossing paths with me."

Leomon regained his senses and pulled his arm back. "Fist of the Beast King!"

"Gatomon, Jump!" Khanemon yelled. Gatomon leapt high in the air as Khanemon intercepted the attack with his staff and redirected it into a nearby tree, knocking it to the ground. He continued spinning his staff until finally slamming it into the ground. "Seismic Slam!"

The ground shook hard and Leomon lost his balance and fell to the ground. From high in the air, Gatomon placed her paws over her eyes for a moment and then removed them quickly. Her eyes flashed brightly for a second.

"Feline Hypnotism!"

Leomon became dazed, lying on the ground holding his head as it slowly wobbled around. As Gatomon landed back on the ground, Khanemon turned toward the nearby fallen tree. He closed his eyes and placed one hand on his head, the other stretched out toward the tree.

"Telekinesis." As he spoke, the tree lifted off the ground and followed his direction toward Leomon. Once the trunk was directly over him, Khanemon opened his eyes, and the tree fell on top of him, pinning him to the ground. Gatomon began walking toward the helpless Leomon.

"It's time to finish this," she said. Leomon swung his claws wildly in a vain attempt to strike her. But he just couldn't reach with the tree pinning him to the ground. "Dour Devour!"

Leomon growled loudly and then fell limp. A large black shadow emerged from Leomon's body and flew to Gatomon, who's eyes swirled and turned black as she inhaled it. Her eyes shut tightly for a few seconds and when she opened them again, none of the darkness remained. "Delicious..." she muttered. Then her body began to glow brightly, and she changed back into Salamon. I ran over to her and she jumped into my arms.

"Salamon, you were great," I told her.

"Thanks Lily."

Khanemon walked to the pinned Leomon and raised his staff in the air. "Seismic Slam!" He struck the tree, which shattered into splinters and dissolved into data. He then reached out with one hand to help the still dizzy Leomon get to his feet. Once on his feet again, Leomon let go of his hand, and Khanemon reverted back to the small tiger form I had seen yesterday. Leomon watched in awe, and then looked around at the rest of us. Four humans and four Digimon.

"Digi-Destined..."

Author notes: Savvy readers might have predicted Salamon's evolution based on the title of the chapter.

On a related note, I chose not to include "Black" in Gatomon's name... seems unnessary to me... just rest assured that it will always be the black version any time she is mentioned... I have no plans of including a regular Gatomon at this time... sorry if you were looking forward to one...

I also slightly changed the names of Gatomon's attacks to more reflect the differences...

And of course, congratulations team on officially being dubbed "Digi-Destined" by the cliche Leomon... the only bigger cliche is goggles on the leader... oh wait, Jetomon has those... close enough...

Well, see you all soon... next chapter coming soon...


	8. Chapter 8: No Place Like

Author Notes: I still don't own any of the Digimon stuff. I'ma just keep putting that on every chapter, so get used to it.

Took long enough, huh? One and a half years, huh? Well, hopefully they start going a bit faster again soon.

Also, this chapter is a little slower and has no action sequence. Sorry to any Kali fans out there, but this chapter is not narrated by her, does not feature a new Knifemon evolution, and indeed, has very little of Kali in it at all. She gets the next one. Sorry, that's the way it went.

Chapter 8

No Place Like...

"What the heck are 'Digi-Destined'?" I asked, more than a little confused as the giant lion creature that had just been attacking us about an hour before was now sitting on a broken tree stump, while we caught up with Lily and tried to find out what was going on.

"I would presume that it is referring to us, Ryan," Kali stated in her usual flat tone. She flipped open her laptop and began typing quickly. "Digi-Destined: A team of human children chosen to save the worlds from destruction. Since the dawn of the digital world, many groups have been called to fill this role from all over the world."

Tank scratched at the back of his head for a second. "Chosen by whom?"

I looked back over at Kali, who began typing away at her laptop again. "Hmmm, data not available," she replied after a few moments. I began looking over the crowd of Digimon we had assembled, but no one, not even Leomon, seemed to have an answer.

"So, we've been chosen... by no one, mind you... to save the worlds from what exactly?" Tank continued.

"Imminent destruction," Leomon growled.

"Yeah, we got that part," Tank replied. "But from what? Or who?" Leomon and the other Digimon were once again without an answer.

"Well, for now we may as well just assume some random eldritch terror that threatens the universe with whatever it may. Moving on, where do we go from here? Obviously, we've gotten into something far over our heads, and it would be a good idea to find a place where we could gather more information."

"Is there some kind of library around here?" Tank asked, looking to Leomon. "We might be able to get some information there."

"There is a library several miles in that direction," Leomon replied. "We could go there, but I would recommend waiting until tomorrow, as several of the Digimon traveling with you appear to be quite exhausted from our unfortunate battle." I looked at the other Digimon. Knifemon appeared to be fine, but Salamon and Tigemon had curled up on Lily and Tank's laps and though they were looking up to pay attention to the conversation, they both looked like they were about to pass out.

Jetomon looked up at me wearily. I shook my head at him. "Not a chance boy, you're too damn big." He kept staring up at me, eyes watering behind his goggles. I rolled my eyes. "Fine, you can rest your head on my lap."

As Jetomon began to lay down, Tank looked over at me. "How does a snake succeed in giving puppy dog eyes?"

"Anyway," Kali interrupted. "We can go check out the library tomorrow after we are all better rested. For now though, are there any other places we might be able to go to get some more information?"

"What about the Overmind?" I asked, remembering him being mentioned a few times before. "Think it might help us out? Whatever 'it' is."

"Good point, what is the Overmind?" Tank repeated.

Kali typed on the computer again and quickly replied, "Still no answer."

"You'll not find him in there," Leomon stated. "The Overmind is a Digimon. He arrived here a few years ago. No one knows where he came from, but he was an old and reclusive Digimon, who would help anyone, so long as they could find him. Despite his reclusive nature, he gained the trust of the locals through his wisdom and kindness. But he also had his own agenda for being here. He was searching for something. But as his search stretched on, he began to change."

"The shadows," Lily said, quietly.

"Not necessarily," Kali replied. "The shadow controlled opponents that we have encountered so far have mindlessly attacked us without even a show of tactical strategy. However, from the Digimon, we have learned that the Overmind is in a position of power, giving orders to other local Digimon. Almost like a general leading his troops. This would have been impossible for any of the shadow controlled Digimon we have encountered so far."

Lily looked down at the ground. Kali had made a good point. Monochromon had certainly come charging at me out of nowhere. And my side was still injured from the battle with Omekamon. But wait...

I jumped to my feet. "What about Leomon?" Everyone turned to look at me. "He stood back and watched us until we attacked him first."

"Settle down Ryan, I was getting to that," Kali replied. I sat back down, feeling a little silly for my outburst. Jetomon sat down on the ground a few feet from me. I had forgotten he was resting his head on my lap.

Kali continued, "As Ryan pointed out, Leomon's behavior while controlled was abnormal by comparison to our battle with Omekamon, Ryan's battle with Monochromon, and the battles that Lily has had in her time here. So there's also the possibility that Leomon was an exception or a special case. And of course, there's a possibility that my hypotheses are all wrong. It's just too early to tell."

"Anyway," Tank replied, returning back to the original topic. "What kind of Digimon is the Overmind?"

Leomon shrugged. "No one knows."

"Wait a second," Tank said. "How is he all famous from all his wisdom and kindness before, and all of his rules and orders now, and nobody knows what he is. You said he always helped Digimon who found him, how would those Digimon not know what he looks like? Or the Digimon that he has given these orders to?"

Kali fiddled with her hair while she thought and then said, "My guess is, you don't get the name 'Overmind' without knowing your way around peoples' brains. His word is well known, but people forget what he looks like within seconds of taking their eyes off of him. But again, this is all just speculation."

"So no ideas on where to find him, then?" asked Tank. No one seemed to have an answer.

I slowly stood up again. "Well, I suppose we should get some rest tonight and then head over to the digi-library in the morning. We can worry about the Overmind later. We may even get some leads on him at the library, if we're lucky."

"So, now I get to go home?" Lily asked, quietly. I could see a kind of faint hope in her eyes. I remembered the cloth holding her ponytail back. Hope or die, it had said. She must have been holding onto that small shred of hope all this time. It must have been so hard.

"Yeah Lily," I replied. "We're gonna get you home now."

"Hopefully," Kali added. I gave her a small glare and she turned back to her computer. This girl has been lost for days in a harsh environment. We WERE going to get her home, no 'hopefully' about it.

"So, what were you doing when you got here?" I asked.

Lily looked confused. "What does that have to do with anything?"

Tank picked Tigemon off his lap and stood up. "Our current theory is that in order to traverse between the two worlds, you have to be involved in some activity that represents who you are in some way. And since you have done it once already to get here, it should be whatever you were doing when you arrived."

Lily looked even more confused. "An activity that represents who I am?"

"Just try to remember what you were doing when you got here," Kali said from behind her computer screen.

Lily looked down at the ground while rubbing her left arm with her right hand. "Well, I got out of school, I went home with my sister, had dinner with the family... Oh! I was listening to music!" she exclaimed, jumping to her feet.

Before anyone could reply, Kali had hit the play button on her keyboard and her computer began playing, already partway into "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd.

"Now just concentrate on home," I told Lily. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. After a few seconds, her head began to sway side to side with the beat. Several moments passed, and after about a minute, she opened her eyes.

Lily's expression became very worried. "It's not working! W-why isn't it working?" She was frantic, and tears were beginning to roll down her cheeks.

"Calm down, Lily," Kali said from behind her computer screen.

"I just want to go home. Why can't I go home? What's wrong with me?" She was panicking, hard. She'd been lost for days, with no family or friends. I could only imagine how scared and lonely she must have felt. We had to figure out how to get her home some how. And we had to do it now.

Tank stood up and spoke to her softly. "Lily, calm down. We're still here and we're not leaving until we figure out a way to get you home." Lily looked at him, tears slowly receding. Her breathing slowed back to normal and she closed her eyes to take another deep breath. "Now," Tank continued, "is there anything else you were doing when you got here? Try to remember."

Lily concentrated for a few seconds and then threw her hands up over her face. "I can't remember!"

"Okay," Tank continued, "stay calm. Let's try another way. Is there anything else you usually do while you're listening to music?"

Lily thought for a second before quietly saying, "Sometimes I dance to the music. When I'm all alone." She blushed slightly.

"Well, try dancing then," Tank replied.

"Right... right now?" Lily asked, sounding nervous. "But you're all watching me."

"Do you want to go home or not?" asked Kali.

"Kali! Be nice," I said, glaring at her. "She's just nervous. Start up a new song." I walked over to Lily and reached my hand out. "Would you like to dance?"

Lily looked a little surprised, just staring at my hand for a few seconds. Then she looked at me and took my hand. "S-sure..."

Jamestown Story's version of "Take Me Home Tonight" began playing from Kali's computer. Lily put her arms over my shoulders while I put my hands on her hips. Her eyes closed as we began slowly dancing to the song. I glanced over my shoulder and saw Salamon mimicking our movements. Or at least the best a dog with an oversized head could. After only a few minutes, everything around us began to blur and streak around in a circle. It was working, but why was it affecting me too? I was surprised, but I kept going for Lily's sake. She was almost home now. The music faded out and the new environment slowly began to stabilize. We were at the edge forest and a large plain of short cut grass. About a hundred yards away, I could make out a large house, with a porch light on. That must have been Lily's home. I looked down at Lily. Her eyes were still closed tight.

"Hey," I said quietly as I stopped the dancing. "You can open your eyes now."

Lily opened her eyes and removed her arms from my shoulders. As she looked around, I saw tears forming in her eyes again. She smiled and said, "We made it..."

"Yeah, I told you we'd get you home," I said with a smile.

She blinked a few times and then looked at me. "Wait, why did you come too? Ummm, not that I don't appreciate your help."

"I dunno," I replied, honestly. "Maybe if someone else does it with you, you can take them along. It's nice to be out for a while anyway. This injury has kept me stuck there, since I can't run. Although, home is pretty far away."

"Where do you live?" she asked.

"Indiana"

"Oh wow, that is really far away," she replied. "Well, you can spend the night at my place and you can go back with me tomorrow."

You sure you're up for going back to the digital world?" I asked. She'd been stuck there for a while, and it would be no surprise if she never wanted to step foot in there again.

She nodded her head firmly. "Yeah. Now that I know how to get back and forth, it won't be so bad. And there's something weird going on over there, and I want to find out what it is."

"Me too!" a voice called out from below. Salamon was standing at Lily's feet.

"Salamon, you came back too?" Lily said, sounding very excited. She bent down and picked Salamon up in her arms, and then stood back up, petting her.

"Yeah, the Digimon can come with us if they perform the action with us," I explained. "She was dancing along with you, just off to your side."

She looked happy to see that Salamon was still with her. "Salamon, do you wanna meet my family?" Lily asked with tears still in her eyes. Lily didn't even wait for a response before she began running for the front door of her house. I instinctively began to run after her, but stopped after the first step when I felt the sharp pain return in my side.

"Lily," I called after her. She stopped and looked back at me. "What are you going to tell your family? It might be hard to convince them of the Digital World, and even if you did, they would probably just freak out or something."

Oh, right." realizing the problem herself. Lily thought for a few seconds while I caught back up with her. "I suppose I could tell them that I ran away from home. It's kind of true anyway. I mean, I didn't physically run away from home, but I did it in my mind, and that's what brought me to the Digital World, right?"

"Well, that's our theory," I replied. "Or the gist of it at the moment, anyway. I suppose we can tell them that you got lost and I helped you find your way home. And gave you a puppy. Or something. Sorry, I'm not much for making plans, I usually just wing everything."

She smiled and said, "We'll work it out." I gave a small nod and together we headed for her front door. She reached for the handle and let out a small gulp. "Well, here we go." She opened the door and took a step inside. It was completely silent inside. "Mom, Dad, I'm home," she spoke softly.

Before she even finished the sentence, the house filled with the sounds of chairs moving and knocked over on tile and furious footsteps racing our direction. I had to step back quickly in order to avoid getting knocked over as her mother came tearing around the corner to wrap her arms around her newly returned daughter. Her father came next, appearing in the same doorway. He stopped there with one hand over his chest and the other on the wall to support his weight. From around another corner, a boy and a girl about my age entered and took positions on either side of their mother and joined in the embrace. Her father slid down to the floor, tears rolling down his cheeks. Cries and sobs emerged constantly from the huddled group next to me. There wasn't a dry eye in the entire house. Not even from me.

Several minutes passed before the crowd took a step back from Lily, although her mother kept her hands on her shoulders, as if she would never let her go again. "I'm home," Lily said again, smiling at her mother.

Her mother returned the smile with a nod. "Yes, you are." Then she began to look her daughter over. "Are you ok? You're not hurt, are you?"

"No, I'm fine, Mom," she replied. I had Ryan to protect me."

"Ryan?" her mother asked with a confused look. It was then that everyone noticed that there was a stranger in the room. Me. Everyone stared at me, waiting for me to say or do something. Trying to decide what to make of me.

I scratched the back of my head and gave a nervous smile. "Uh, heh, I don't know about 'protecting' or anything. I just saw her out in the woods and helped her find her way back home."

"The woods?" her mother echoed, with a worried look in her eyes. Maybe I should have picked a different location to say that she had been lost in. Although, no matter what I had said, they would probably have been just as worried.

Lily's father finally got up from the floor and walked over to her, giving his daughter a big hug. "We're just glad that she's safe and back home where she belongs." Then he turned to me. "Thank you for returning her to us." Then he looked down and saw Salamon sitting on the floor between Lily and I. "Oh, is this puppy yours?" he asked.

"Uh, no," I replied. "Lily had that puppy with her when I found her."

"I found it abandoned in the woods. It was scared and hungry and for some reason, it doesn't make any noise," Lily explained, adding just a little emphasis on that last part, which thankfully Salamon picked up on and remained completely silent. "She took a liking to me and I was hoping I could keep it."

Lily's mother wiped some tears out of her eyes and said, "Of course you can, honey. You can have any kind of pet you want, as long as you don't disappear like that anymore."

Lily's father turned his attention back to me. "Well Ryan, we were just about to have dinner..."

Lily's mother suddenly jumped up. "Oh, the lasagna!" she shouted as she quickly walked back to the kitchen wiping a few more tears from her eyes.

Lily's father chuckled and continued, "We'd love for you to join us. We have plenty of food and we can set out an extra place at the table."

"Oh, sure," I replied. "That'd be great."

"Then it's settled," he stated. "Let's go eat. We can catch up over dinner." We followed him into the dining room where there was a large table laid out with with large bowls containing Broccoli with cheese, salad, mixed fruit, and a tray with sliced bread and butter on it. There were five plates set at the table with silverware. Lily's mother was in the kitchen fixing up the lasagna.

"This is a lot of food," Lily said, surprised by the feast in front of her. "Why did you make so much? Is someone coming over?"

"Well," her father replied smiling, "yes and no. Your mother has insisted on making a large fancy meal every night since you went missing. Said you'd be hungry when you came back. Every night, she would set your plate at the table, put some food on it, and wait for you to come home. The first night, after she went to bed, I tossed the food and washed the plate. That turned out to be a mistake, as the next morning, your mother started running around the house screaming 'She's home! She's home!' and looking everywhere for you. Broke her heart again to find out that I was the one that threw the food out and washed the plate. So after that, I left the plate alone, and the next morning she got up, got rid of the food herself, and began preparing for that night's dinner. It's been that way every day since then. She really missed you. Well, we all did."

"Alright, everything's ready!" Lily's mother called out from the kitchen. She entered the dining room carrying a large dish of lasagna and set it in the center of the table. Lily's father walked past her into the kitchen and came back out with an extra plate and silverware and placed them on the table. Everyone found seats around the table, while I took the last remaining seat, across from Lily, who smiled at me as I sat down and prepared to eat. Lily's father bowed his head and began to say a prayer.

"Dear father, we thank you today for this food you have given us and this house that you have allowed us to provide for so that our family can feel safe and sheltered at home, but most importantly, today we thank you for bringing our daughter back to us safe and sound." As he said the prayer, I looked around at all the people at the table. To my left, Lily's sister and father sat with their heads bowed and eyes shut, to my right, Lily's mother did the same, but her brother simply sat quietly with his hands in his lap. Across from me, Lily sat with head bowed and eyes closed, but eventually found herself staring back at me smiling while her father finished the prayer. "Please continue to watch over and protect us all, including our guest, who, through your will, made our family whole once more. In the name of our lord, Jesus, Amen." All closed eyes opened up and everyone prepared to eat. Neither Lily nor her brother made any attempt to hide the fact that they had not taken part in the prayer. Everyone knew and was fine with it. Not even difference in religious views got in the way of this family's love. They had a rare and special relationship that few families can boast.

Lily's mom began to dish out the food to everyone. While we waited, Lily's father decided to strike up a little conversation. "So Ryan, are you from around here?" he asked.

"No," I replied as a scoop of lasagna was placed on my plate. "Thank you, Mrs. Hope. No, I'm from up north, in Indiana."

"Oh, what brings you all the way down to Arkansas?"

"Camping trip. Well, camping field trip. For geology class. Spend a week down here looking at all of the rocks and stuff."

"Oh, are you in college? What are you studying for?"

"Uh, I haven't really made up my mind. Maybe something with Math or Science. Maybe something with computers. Maybe Psychology. I guess I haven't really found my calling yet."

"Ah, well, you're still a young boy. You've got plenty of time to figure it out."

"Hey Daddy," Lily said, entering into the conversation. "I was hoping Ryan could spend the night here tonight. He got hurt on the way over, and I don't want to make him walk all the way back to his camp site this late at night." She smiled at me and gave me a small wink.

"Your injured?" Her father said with concern in his voice.

"Oh, I just fell on a big rock out in the woods. It's a little sore, but it should be fine soon." I wasn't nearly as convinced of this as I sounded. I was actually fairly sure that I had at least cracked a rib, but it wasn't really their issue to deal with, and I didn't want to spoil their happiness of having their daughter back.

Her father rubbed his chin for a few seconds. "Hmmm... If Shelly was here, she could examine you, but I suppose if you think it's fine, then we'll let it go. As for spending the night, we have a couple empty bedrooms in the house left from our kids that have already moved out."

Dinner went on about like this for a while. Afterwards, Lily and I gave our fabricated story of how she had gotten depressed one night, snuck out to take a walk in the woods, and then got lost, and how I found her while camping with my class mates, and having seen the story on the news, decided to help her return to her home. Luckily, they believed the story.

Finally, at a around 2 in the morning, everyone went to bed, and I was shown to Arthur's room, which was crammed from floor to ceiling with detective novels and similar items. I checked my phone and saw a few texts from Tank explaining that after we left, He and Lily went back home, and that it had been decided to meet up around nine in the morning to start our mission. I was slightly surprised to see no messages from Kali. Maybe she was mad about me leaving with Lily. I hadn't really meant to, it just kind of happened. On the other hand, she was never really the one to start conversations, so maybe I was just over thinking things. I laid down on the bed and fell asleep fairly quickly considering all that had happened recently. Guess I was just really tired. It was nice to be in an actual bed again.

I opened my eyes again as the first rays of light entered through the window. Only I didn't see light. I saw a wide pair of eyes staring back at me. The surprise was enough to send me out of the bed and straight onto the floor, blanket and all.

"Shhh..." Lily said quietly, kneeling down by the side of the bed. "Some people are still sleeping."

"You scared the fricken hell out of me. What are you doing?"

"We should start getting ready for our trip to the Digital World."

I climbed back onto the bed and looked at the clock on the dresser by the bed. "Ngh... Meeting starts at nine... It's only seven thirteen... gimme another hour..."

Lily rolled her eyes. "Ryan... Time zones... it's after eight in Indiana."

"Awww, crap," I said, realizing that she was right. I reached for the blanket to pull it off of me and then stopped. "Ummm... Lily, could you, like, leave for a minute?"

"Huh, why?"

"Well, I just woke up... and I'm only wearing boxers under here..."

"Oh." Lily noticed the wadded up shirt and shorts at the foot of the bed and reddened a little. "Alright," she said as she began to head for the door, but then stopped again. "Wait, what does just waking up have to do with it?"

"Just go!"

"Alright, alright, going." After she left the room, I climbed out of bed and put my clothes back on. Who just stands next to somebody and stares at them until they wake up? What a strange girl. I walked out the door and found Lily standing just outside with Salamon by her side. "C'mon, my dad is making breakfast, we can get some before we leave."

Lily's dad made pancakes, bacon, and eggs for the entire family. We ate breakfast and then tried to convince her family to let her leave for the day. They weren't happy with the idea, considering they had just gotten her back, but in the end, Lily convinced them to let her help me back to my campsite, since I was injured. As we walked out the door, Lily called back, "I'll be back for dinner, I promise!"

I felt a little uneasy when she said that. We were going to a dangerous world, and as I had already proven, any one of us could get seriously injured... or worse. There was no guarantee that any of us would be coming back at all. Maybe we were in over our heads.

We walked a fair distance away from the house so that we would be out of sight when we left for the digital world. When we finally stopped, I looked at Lily. "Lily, are you sure about doing this? About going back to that world? You had a lot of trouble getting back last time. Plus, the Digital World is a violent, crazy world. Anything could happen. We can't be certain that you'll make it back to your family."

Lily just smiled back at me. "Ryan, you heard what Leomon said, right? We're Digi-Destined. We're fighting to save both worlds. It's our destiny. Nothing like that is going to happen to us, because then we wouldn't be able to save the world. I'm going to be fine. You're going to be fine. We're all going to be just fine. The good guys always win." She sounded so certain of herself. I wasn't so sure. Was it really that simple? That easy? She seemed to think that being chosen warriors for good made us invincible somehow. I hoped she was right.

"Alright, well, if you're sure," I said. "Then let's get going" Lily nodded, set Salmon on the ground, and took my hands. "Just like last time, think about going back to the digital world. Think about leaving this world behind. And just dance." Lily swayed her head slightly from side to side to get a beat going in her head. Then she began to slowly dance with me to that beat. As we moved, the world again began to blur. Trees melted away and moved into different locations. Clouds chased each other around at high speed. Off to the side, Salamon mimicked our movements the best that a tiny oddly shaped dog could. After a few moments, our surroundings began to settle. We had finally arrived.

Lily stopped moving, but her eyes stayed closed. She still had a firm grasp on my hands. "Hey, Lily," I said softly. "You can open your eyes now. We're here." She slowly opened her eyes and looked at me. Then she blinked a few times and looked around and finally down at Salamon.

"We're back," she said softly.

"Hey," a voice called out from far to my right. Then Tank and Kali came walking out from the trees. Kali had her head buried in her laptop, as usual. Tank waved at us with a smile. "You're also late."

To Be Continued...

Author notes:

This chapter had the potential to run a lot longer, but part way into the dinner scene, I realized that it wasn't really getting anywhere or accomplishing anything, so I started cutting things short. Originally there was going to be a lot more conversation in the dinner and after dinner scenes, and even a late night dialogue between Ryan and Milton, but it just seemed unnecessary.

Next time, we pick back up with Kali. Sorry again if any of her fans expected more of her in this chapter (I talk as if I actually have fans... Ha ha). Anyway, I'll try to get the next one out soon.


	9. Chapter 9: On Edge

Usual disclaimer thingy: I don't own this stuff. Except for the parts I made up myself.

Author notes: Here's that missing Kali chapter that I'm sure you were all dying to read. She got delayed, but she's finally here.

Chapter 9

On Edge

"You're also late," Tank shouted from next to me as we walked. I glanced up from my laptop briefly to see Ryan and Lily standing about fifty feet ahead of us then quickly put my head back down. I was still busy trying to find information on Digi-Destined, the Overmind, and a handful of other things that were discussed the previous night. I was having no more luck than I was then, and was beginning to wonder why I was even bothering.

"Yeah, yeah," Ryan replied as he and Lily began to walk toward us. "We had to convince her parents to let her back out of the house again. It's not like we could just tell them that the fate of two worlds is hanging in the balance. They'd have just called a shrink, and then we'd have never gotten her out of there."

"Yeah, I suppose that's true," Tank responded. "Well, it's good to see you again, we were rather surprised when you vanished like that." Yeah... I suppose surprised is one way of putting it. "So how was your night?"

"Had a good meal. Got to sleep on a bed again. All in all, not too bad." As the four of us reached a meeting point, Ryan put his arms around me. "Good to be back though." I glanced up and saw Lily standing behind him. Her facial expression quickly changed to a weak smile. Was that surprise I saw before the smile? Had she not realized that Ryan and I were dating? No, I suppose she had not had any exposure to us being together in a relaxed setting. I removed one arm from my laptop between Ryan and I and put it around him. Lily's smile drained a little before she turned her head to the side and walked around us to talk to Tank.

"Sooo..." Lily started, dragging out the word. "I guess we're off to the library today?" Ryan ended our embrace and turned around.

"Yeah, hey, where's Jetomon?" Ryan asked.

"Sent him to track down Leomon," Tank stated. "In case we need help finding the library or getting into it."

"Ah, good idea," Ryan replied. "Plus, if the Overmind shows up and puts up a fight, he could lend a hand."

"So I guess we're just waiting for them now?" Lily asked.

Ryan pulled his DS out of his pocket and started playing it. Tank chuckled lightly and said, "Yeah, shouldn't be too long. Jetomon runs pretty fast." Tank sat down on the grass and Tigemon jumped into his lap and curled up. I found a nice large tree to sit under. The shade helped me see my computer screen better. Once I got settled in, it was back to research.

"Sooo... What'cha playin?" I looked up to see Lily standing in front of Ryan peering over his DS.

"Sonic," Ryan said, not taking his eyes off the screen for even a moment.

"Coooool..." Lily replied. "My brother used to play Sonic with me when I was a kid. He always made me play as Tails and fly him around all the time." What exactly was she doing? And what did she mean when she was a kid? She's still just a kid.

Lily glanced around a bit and noticed me looking at her. She looked away quickly and then wandered off about twenty feet and laid face down on the grass with Salamon following suit near Lily's head.

"That's better," I mumbled quietly to myself. I felt a weight on my head shift forward. I had nearly forgotten that Knifemon was still sitting up there.

"You say something, Kali?" she asked.

"No," I lied. "Just wish Jetomon and Leomon would hurry up and..."

"We're back!" I hadn't even finished the sentence when Jetomon's voice came from over a hilltop. He and Leomon were walking our direction.

Ryan slapped his DS shut and began to walk toward Jetomon. "Jetomon, buddy, I missed you." Jetomon ran toward Ryan and ran a few circles around him. Leomon caught up shortly after.

"Is everyone ready?" Leomon asked.

Tigemon jumped off of Tank's lap as Tank stood up and stretched. "Yeah, I think we're ready to go." I shut my laptop, slid it into my side bag, and climbed back to my feet. We grouped closer together in a loose circle.

"So, which way to the Digi-Library?" Ryan asked.

Leomon lifted an arm and pointed off to the side. "It is just a short distance in that direction. It should not take us long to get there."

"It'll take us no time at all if Jetomon digivolves!" Ryan exclaimed, raising a fist into the air. "We can all just ride on his back."

"I do not think that is a very good idea," Leomon replied. "The Overmind may be there and it may wish to put up a fight, in which case it would be wise to conserve our energy."

Ryan sulked a little. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

Tank gave him a pat on the back. "Cheer up, he said it's not that far away."

"Yeah, yeah... I hate walking."

I started walking in the direction Leomon had pointed. "Well, the sooner start walking, the sooner we will be done walking, and the sooner we get to that library. I am eager to see what kind of knowledge I can obtain once we're there."

There was a brief silence before heard Ryan say, "Hey, wait up!" followed by the sound of everyone beginning to follow. Ryan ran up beside me and slowed to a walk to meet my pace. Jetomon was just on the other side of him. I turned my head to look over my shoulder and saw Tank and Lily holding Tigemon and Salamon respectively while following close behind us and Leomon staying at the rear. Tank and Tigemon were talking about something, but I couldn't hear what they were saying. Lily smiled at me. I turned back forward and reached for Ryan's hand. Ryan appeared to not even notice as I grabbed his hand.

Leomon's definition of not very far was apparently quite different from the rest of us. I guess technology like cars makes you kind of jaded on short trips in which several miles are covered in only a matter of minutes. After nearly an hour of walking, a tower came into view from over a hill.

"There," Leomon called up from the back of the party. "At the base of that tower is the library. As he spoke, we came to the top of the hill There was a strange looking moss covered building that the tower seemed to be growing out of. The two did not look like they were made by the same builder at all. More like someone had just stuck a big clock tower on the top of a giant mud hut.

"Hey," Ryan said. "This is where I found Lily yesterday when we needed her to help with Leomon."

"It is?" Lily asked. "Yeah, I guess so, the top of that tower looks familiar, but there was a big lake here yesterday." Ryan and Jetomon looked at each other with confused expressions. "The tower was sticking out from the middle of the lake. It was so big, I couldn't even see the other side," she said.

Ryan continued to look confused. "I don't remember seeing any lake."

"Me either," Jetomon added.

Lily looked down at Salamon in her arms. "You saw the lake, didn't you, Salamon?"

Salmon looked up at her quietly for a few seconds. "Ummm... I guess I wasn't really paying attention very much... I'm sorry."

Lily began to look a little worried. "I swear, there was a big lake here yesterday."

"Well, either way," Ryan said, "It doesn't really make a difference now. There's no lake today, which is good, because we need to get into that library anyway. Let's go." Ryan began to walk down the hill toward the strange building at the base of the tower. Something about that tower was bugging me. It looked oddly familiar. And the closer I got to it, the more familiar it looked.

"Does anyone else think that this tower looks oddly familiar?" I asked. Everyone stopped walking and looked up.

"No, not really," Ryan said.

"Wait, that looks like the bell tower on campus." Tank was right. That was where I recognized the tower from.

"Oh yeah," Ryan said, finally recognizing it himself. "I don't have any classes near it, so I don't see it that often."

"Wait, what?" Lily was understandably confused.

"Oh, we all go to the same university," Tank explained. "This tower looks just like the bell tower on our campus."

"Hey, you think it is the campus bell tower?" Ryan asked. "Kinda like how Kali's place showed up here, and they ended up being the same building."

I had forgotten about the small house we found here and how we discovered that it was linked to my actual house in our world. "It's possible. As such, we should try not to damage it in any way. Things would get rather hectic if something unexplainable happened to the bell tower. We don't want to start a panic or anything." I began to walk back toward the building. "Come on, let's get inside so we can start our research."

Ryan ran past me to the door and grabbed the handle to open, but he stopped. "Hey, the door's wet." He reached over and put his hand on the wall by the door. "The whole building is wet."

"See?" Lily said. "There was a lake here."

"It probably just rained last night," I replied. "Giant lakes do not simply dry up overnight." I stepped forward and grabbed the handle. It was wet and cold, but there was something else strange. It felt like my energy was being drained out through my finger tips. Something was wrong, but it hadn't seemed to affect Ryan. Was it just me? The longer I held onto the doorknob, the worse it became. I began to feel sick and depressed. My body started to ache. Something echoed in my head. Calling my name...

"Kali!" I noticed everyone crowded around me. Ryan looked at me worriedly. "You alright?" he asked.

"Uh, yeah..." I shook my head. "Just cramps, I guess." I turned the knob and pushed the door open. As soon as I let go of the handle, everything returned to normal. Everyone walked into the building and began looking around. Tank stopped next to me.

"You sure you're all right?" he asked.

I nodded my head. "Yeah, just fine, actually. Not sure what came over me." Maybe the door was trapped somehow. Although that wouldn't explain why Ryan seemed to be unaffected by it.

"Hey, look," Ryan called. "The bottom of the clock tower is over here." Tank and I walked over to Ryan, who was indeed standing at the base of a large pillar reaching up to the roof of the building. As I walked around the pillar, I saw an engraved plaque on one side. This was the definitely the clock tower from campus. I reached my hand out and touched the plaque. It was wet, and I immediately felt everything that I felt while holding the doorknob come rushing back. I moved my hand quickly. Was the entire building messed up? Or was it the water?

"Hey, there's a lot of books here," Lily said. I looked around at the aisles of books surrounding the tower.

"Well, it is a library," Ryan commented. "Be kind of a crappy library if it didn't have a lot of books." I started walking down one of the aisles.

"Yeah, but being in the Digital World, I kinda figured it would be more... I dunno, digital," Tank added. Their continued conversation faded out as they walked down the aisles on the other side of the library. I glanced over the spines of the books as I passed them, pulling titles that I thought might be of interest to us. Once I had an arm full of books, I set them on a table in the middle of the library next to the clock tower and started looking down the aisles on the other side of the library. By the time I was finished grabbing books, I had a stack of fifteen different books to look through.

As I settled down with my new research materials, I saw the others around the room. Tank had sat down at the table in front of me with three books and a fourth that he was reading. Tigemon was standing on the table across from him with a fifth book open in front of him. He licked his right paw and then turned a page and continued reading. Lily sat two tables past Tank with a single book open. Salamon sat on the table next to Lilly and cleaned herself. Leomon stood by the base of the clock tower carefully reading a book he had chosen. Jetomon followed Ryan as he walked up and down the aisles pulling books off the shelf one by one, flipping through a few pages, and setting them back on whatever shelf he happened to be near. "Remind me to never take him to a real library," I muttered to myself.

Knifemon hopped down off of my head. "Ok," she said cheerily. I gave her a few pats on the head and then remembered that razor blades shoot out of the top of her head on occasion and quickly removed my hand and rubbed the spot on my arm where one of her knives had cut me before. She noticed. "Hey, I won't hurt you again. I promise. It was just an accident."

"Yeah, sorry... my track record in that area isn't very strong. A lot of people hurt me, even when they promise not too."

"But I'm not a people," she replied. "I'm your friend. Your partner."

"Yeah... you're right. I'm sorry." I gave her a soft grin. "Hey, how about we see what we can find out, ok?" Knifemon nodded and I opened up the first book to begin our research.

I began with researching some basic information about the Digital World. Structurally, the Digital World is very similar to the real world. It's mostly covered in wide oceans with several large landmasses, the locations for which correlated with the locations of the continents in the real world, although they aren't shaped the same. The Digital World is also not very stable. Glitches and bugs occur frequently. In order to help stabilize it, there is are four guardians placed in the four compass directions who are supervised by one supreme guardian.

Being intrigued by these guardians, I went looking through my other books to try to find information on them. One of the larger texts was titled "Digimon Sovereign".

The four Sovereign Digimon are the guardians of the digital world. Each Sovereign enforces the law and stability of the region in which it resides. As the role of the Sovereign is of such importance to the existence of the Digital World, when a Sovereign is threatened, it will usually summon a group of chosen individuals known as Digi-Destined to protect the Sovereign and its region of the Digital World in its time of need. If the Sovereign in that area has been incapacitated in some way, the region that it governs will slowly degrade until a replacement for the Sovereign is instated. If that region comes under threat during that time, the fifth Sovereign may call a chosen group in place of the missing one.

"Hmmm... let's see what we can find on Digi-Destined," I mumbled to myself reaching for another book. Digi-Destined refers to a group of humans, usually between three and eight, from the material world, each paired with a Digimon, who are tasked with a mission of importance to the Digital World. Chosen individuals are usually between ten and fifteen years of age, although older groups are possible. No matter what age the group is, once chosen, they remain Digi-Destined for the rest of their lives and may be called on again at a later time or assist newer chosen groups as needed. It is possible, although exceedingly rare, for a single individual to be chosen instead of a group. The only such case to be documented is Ryou Akiyama.

Ryou Akiyama was known as the legendary tamer. He was chosen to combat the threat of Milleniummon, a task which he had to complete multiple times. During his last battle with MoonMilleniummon decades ago, Akiyama was directly aided by the Sovereign Digimon in the hopes that Milleniummon could be defeated once and for all. Repeated near death experiences greatly damaged the mental health of Akiyama. After his final battle With MoonMilleniummon, Akiyama and Milleniummon both vanished and were never seen again. Akiyama displayed the unique ability to utilize multiple Digimon at one time, even those Digimon who were already partnered to other chosen individuals.

A voice broke my concentration. It was Lily. "Hey, I think I found something about that Lake."

I rolled my eyes. "Lily, we're not looking for some phantom lake right now."

"Maybe you should be." That wasn't Lily. That wasn't any of us. It was a voice that came from the library's entrance. Within the doorway stood... a scarecrow with a miner hat and a bow and quiver of arrows?

"Hey," Lily said. "That's the same scarecrow I saw yesterday in the forest." Scarecrows don't usually talk or show up in forests and libraries. This was a Digimon.

"That is the Overmind," Leomon said dropping the book he held and drawing his sword.

"What?" Tank, Lily, and I all stood up at the same time. Ryan came running from the back of the library and stopped between us and the new Digimon.

"What do you want?" Ryan demanded. It was impossible to read any kind of expression from the Digimon. All of his facial features were made up of Japanese characters, and never changed. I pulled up my laptop in order to find out what I could about it.

"I want you to fulfill your duty... WITHOUT poking your noses where they don't belong. This area is off limits, get out now."

"And if we refuse?" Ryan replied.

"Then I will have to force you to leave this area." We couldn't afford to just abandon this opportunity for research. It looked like we had a fight on our hands after all.

"Bring it on, straw-brain! Jetomon, let's go!" Ryan and Jetomon took off toward the Digimon. I really wish he'd think a little more before jumping into action sometimes.

"Ryan, we don't want to damage the library or the clock tower, try to take it outside," I shouted after him.

"Right! Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Jetomon, Digivolve to... Machdramon!"

Machdramon blasted straight through the doorway, taking the Overmind with him. Effective, if a little brutish. I picked up my computer, still trying to search for this apparently rare Digimon, and followed the others outside where the battle was taking place. Or lack of a battle, it seemed in this case. Every time Machdramon landed an attack on the Overmind, he just vanished and reappeared somewhere else with no damage at all.

"Hold still, you little bastard!" Ryan yelled. The Overmind wasn't even attack or trying to dodge the attacks. He just teleported somewhere else anytime an attack hit him. He was taunting us.

Tank grabbed his Digivice. "Lily, we'd better help out." Lily nodded and grabbed her Digivice as well.

"Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Tigemon, Digivolve to... Khanemon!"

"Salamon, Digivolve to... Gatomon!"

They immediately joined in to help Machdramon, but it quickly became apparent that the three of them combined couldn't manage to hit him. If only we could get some idea of how to deal some actual damage. I looked back to my computer and saw that it had finally found some information on what kind of Digimon this was. I read the information out loud so that the group could hear it as well.

"It's a Nohemon. Virus type puppet Digimon. Armor level? What the heck is an armor level? Whatever, the only other thing it says is to be cautious, because Nohemon are very deceitful."

"That helps about as much as a hole in the head," Ryan complained.

"Happy to comply," Nohemon replied, pulling his bow out and fitting it with an arrow.

"Thunder Paw!" Gatomon lunged at Nohemon and struck a solid blow. But she just passed right through him as Nohemon teleported away again and reappeared twenty feet away with his bow drawn and ready.

"William's Arrow!" Nohemon released the arrow, and from that one arrow, dozens of arrows went flying straight toward Ryan.

Machdramon ran in front of Ryan and faced the incoming arrows. "Sonic Disruption!" All of the arrows were caught up in Machdramon's attack and dissolved away. The attack continued through and hit Nohemon solid. But Nohemon didn't even move. He didn't even flinch, he just stood there like nothing was happening.

"This is growing tiresome," Nohemon said. He disappeared again, and reappeared standing on Machdramon's back. "Delusion Claw!" Nohemon swung an open hand at the back of Machdramon's head. His hand passed straight through and then he immediately teleported to safety again.

"Argh!" Machdramon cried out, and then fell forward, falling on the ground. His body glowed white and he degenerated back into Jetomon.

"Jetomon!" Ryan wrapped his arms around his fallen partner. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah..." Jetomon replied, weakly. "I'm just... tired."

"Everyone be careful," Tank shouted. "This one is gonna be tough." As if to prove Tank's statement even further, Nohemon began teleporting around us repeatedly, no longer waiting until an attack was going to strike him. He was simultaneously circling us and confusing us, and it was working. Tank, Khanemon, Lily, and Gatomon stood turning in place trying to keep track of him, but the moment anyone laid an eye on him, he vanished again. They began to slowly group closer together.

"He's trying to throw us off!" I shouted. "Don't let him round you up like that."

"William's Arrow!" It was impossible to tell which direction his voice had come from.

"Kali, look out!" Lily shouted. I turned around quickly and saw another myriad of arrows flying straight at me. I threw my arms up in front of my face, but even as I did, I knew that wouldn't protect me.

"Kunai Storm!" I felt a mild gust of wind and once it had passed, I lowered my arms and looked around. Knifemon stood a few feet before me, and lying on the ground around her were several arrows, each with a matching blade sticking into it. The remaining arrows must have flown past me, causing the gust of wind that I had felt. Knifemon turned around and looked up at me.

"Knifemon, you..."

"I've been working on my aim," she said, calmly. "I told you I'd never hurt you again."

"Yeah... I guess you did." I felt like I could really trust her now. I hadn't trusted anybody in a very long time, but I trusted her now. I smiled at her, and then a bright light appeared before me. I had seen this light before. I was getting my own Digivice like the others had gotten before. I reached out and took it. It was warm and inviting. It had the same shape as the others, but with blue on black. The screen glowed and slowly typed out DIGIVOLUTION. I looked down at Knifemon. "Are you ready?"

"let's knock the stuffing out of him," she replied.

"Right. Digivolution, activate!"

Digivolution

"Knifemon Digivolve too..."

Knifemon's mechanical eyes vanished, and out of the holes emerged a pair of long slender arms with a blade on each elbow and three blades in place of fingers. The body stretched out and grew a pair of thin legs with a blade on each knee and ending in a point instead of feet. A large metal sphere materialized on top of the body. Two metal bands clamped onto the sphere, one at the bottom appearing to be a mask covering the mouth and nose, and the other on top like a head band. Dozens of long thin metallic cables covered in razor blades emerged from behind the head band, forming a type of hair stretched down to the middle of the torso. On the front of the head, two large holes appeared and a pair of mechanical violet eyes appeared deep inside.

"Blademon!"

Blademon stood before me, a little over four feet tall, and looking like she could give the Terminator a run for its money. She walked slowly toward Khanemon and Gatomon, but stopped about fifteen feet away. Her mechanical hair began to grow longer and fan out and move around, until she had a flailing net of razor hair spreading ten feet in every direction.

"Replacing a fallen fighter will not help you any," Nohemon called out and began teleporting around randomly again, only faster than ever. He appeared next to Khanemon, who took a swipe with his staff, but was again too slow. Nohemon immediately vanished, reappearing on the other side of him.

"Delusion Claw!" In no more than three seconds, Nohemon threw a jumping uppercut at Khanemon, his hand passing right through him, then teleported behind Gatomon, slamming his fist downward through her to the ground, and teleported behind Blademon, only to be hit by the mass of hair and teleport next her again two more times, each failing to do anything more than get hit by Blademon's razor hair, and finally teleporting to a safe spot thirty feet away from her. Khanemon and Gatomon both fell over and degenerated back to Tigemon and Salamon. Tank and Lily rushed to the aid of their respective fallen partners. Nohemon and Blademon, however stood at a stand off.

Nohemon sized up his opponent for a minute. "I can't seem to get close to you, but as you can see, you can't hurt me either. None of you could. So all I have to do is fire arrows at you from a distance until you're worn out. William's Arrow!" Nohemon began firing a non stop barrage of arrows at Blademon, most being sliced up by her flailing razor hair, but a few were making it through the net and striking her body. I had to do something. But what could I do? I began looking looking over the information on Nohemon on my computer screen again. There was so little information though. But then something caught my eye.

"Blademon, he's a puppet Digimon. Doesn't that mean that there should be a controller somewhere?" The torrent of arrows halted.

"Silence, human!" Nohemon lunged at me, but Blademon was closer and jumped in front of me. I cringed as I was engulfed by the deadly bladed mass of hair, but soon noticed that every strand moved fluidly around me.

"I'm... safe?" I had thought for a moment that I was going to be inadvertently sliced to ribbons.

"Like I said before, I won't hurt you again," Blademon said. "Now, I have a plan. Nohemon's disposition changed almost immediately when you mentioned the controller, so I'm betting you were right. It's probably close by too, or he wouldn't have felt so threatened. What I need you to do is slowly lay down on the ground and I'll see if I can hit the hidden controller."

"Alright," I replied and began to slowly get down on the ground as the razor cables continued to protect me from any external threats. Once I was down on the ground, I could see Ryan, Tank, and Lily all crouched down caring for their partner Digimon. Blademon was planning on using an area of effect attack, like the one her rookie form uses, but this one wouldn't hit near the ground, leaving us all safe. At least I hoped.

"Razor Storm!" Blademon began spinning in circles and strands of her metallic hair flew off in every direction. It was like an intense shrapnel filled explosion. At first the strands flew straight out, but eventually they began to erratically change direction and fill the air with a thick cloud of weaving razor blades. Then, all at once, the strands returned to Blademon and reformed the hair like cables extending from her head, where she retracted them back to their original length and relaxed them. I looked up at where Nohemon had been before, and he was still there, frozen in the pose of pulling back an arrow to fire. His body began to crackle a distort like a TV with no reception. Then it vanished.

"Did we get him?" I asked, climbing back to my feet. As if to answer my question, I heard a soft thump behind me. I turned around and saw a small black bird that had fallen to the ground. Only the bird looked like it was made of cloth stitched together. I looked at my computer again and realized that this bird was sitting on the shoulder of the Nohemon pictured on the screen. I wasn't sure how I had missed that before, but it made sense. The scarecrow was just a puppet. The crow was the actual Digimon. "That's him," I said to Blademon. "You got him." Blademon glowed brightly and reverted back into Knifemon. I picked her up and placed her back on top of my head where she could get some rest. I then turned to look over my shoulder at the rest of the group. "Lily, Salamon, he's ready."

"Are you sure he's controlled by one of those shadows?" Lily asked.

"No, not really, but we can at least try." The entire group gathered around the fallen Crow Digimon.

"Here goes," Salamon said. "Dour Devour!" A large dark shadow emerged from the crow and flew into Salamon's mouth, where it vanished for good. "Cough, Cough!"

"You ok?" Lily asked. Salamon chocked a bit and coughed a few more times, then nodded slowly.

"Were there bones in that shadow?" Ryan asked. We didn't get a chance to respond as the small crow began to glow brightly and change shape. It looked just like what happened when one of our Digimon degenerated back to it's original form. When it was done, it resembled a large caterpillar. I brought my computer back up and searched for information on this new form.

"Wormmon. Virus type insect Digimon. Not a whole lot of information on..." I didn't get to finish that thought, as the Wormmon began talking as well.

"What is it saying?" Lily asked.

"I don't know, it's speaking Japanese," I replied. "Hold on, I'll bring up a translator." I started typing furiously on my computer to find something to translate what he was saying. I wanted to hear as much of this as I could, and it looked like I was running out of time, as a minute later, he began to glow and change again, this time taking the form of a strange looking caccoon.

"Why does he keep doing that?" Lily asked, looking worried.

"I don't know!," I replied, still frantically working on the translation program. "There!" I activated the program, and immediately the English translation echoed out of the small Digimon as well.

"... never found them. But something else found us. Something we had long since forgotten about. It overpowered us. We were defeated. We split up to make our escape, but for some of us, it was too late. We should never have gone there in the first place. I tried to tell him that. But he insisted. We should never have gone there.

"Where?" Tank asked. "Where did you go? What attacked you?"

The small Digimon closed his eyes. He looked like he was about to cry. He flashed brightly again and degenerated again, taking the form of a small green ball with a large leaf on its head and a pacifier in its mouth. Then he continued. "We should never have gone back... to the Dark Ocean..." Lily gasped loudly and we all looked at her. "You..." the small Digimon said quietly. We looked back and saw that he was staring straight at Lily. "It's because of me. I'm sorry. I wish... I could make it up to you somehow. But, I'm out of time now." He began to glow again, slower this time.

"Wait," Lily cried. "What's happening to you?"

The small Digimon closed his eyes again before being completely engulfed in light. "We chosen Digimon... are not meant to outlive... our partners..." The light reached its brightest and then dissipated, leaving the form of a large egg. I recalled Ryan's tale of fighting Monochromon a while back and that when defeated, Monochromon turned back into an egg and would later hatch again just fine. But this was different. We watched in horror as the egg turned dark gray and then dissolved into ash and blew away on the wind. Everyone looked absolutely terrified.

"Partner?" Lily asked with tears in her eyes. "He doesn't mean..."

"A human partner," I replied. "Most likely."

"He said he was a chosen Digimon," Ryan said. "Does that mean he was like us? And they were killed. What if we're next?"

"I... I don't know," I replied. Even I was shaken up by what had just transpired. We were definitely in over our heads now. What were we supposed to do now?

"Alright, that obviously freaked us all out quite a bit," Tank said. "Let's just slow down for a second. Take a few deep breaths." We all took his advice and tried to settle down a little. "Now, I think we should call it a day for now. We should all go home, get a good night's rest, and not think about this until the morning. Then we can get together and discuss what this all meant and where we should go from here. But we're not going to get anywhere just spazzing out about it right now." He was right. The best course of action at the moment was to just sleep on it for now. Tomorrow we would be able to make more rational decisions.

"Yeah, that's a good idea," I confirmed. "Let's all just go home."

"Yeah..." Ryan replied. "Let's go, Tank. If we practice your karate stuff together, I can probably get back there with you." Ryan was holding his side again. I guess the adrenaline had dulled his sense of pain, and now that the action was over, it was all catching back up to him. Tank didn't even correct him about his aikido being different from karate. The just wandered off a short distance, where Tank walked him through a few easy steps, and in about a minute, they were gone, along with their Digimon, leaving me and Lily alone with our thoughts and our Digimon.

We sat silently for a few minutes, avoiding each others' stares. Salamon and Lily began whispering to each other, until eventually, Lily stood up and walked over to me, reaching a hand out.

"I... think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot," she said shyly. "I... wanted to apologize." Before all of this, my reaction would probably have been to reject her, but now, the problems I had with her just seemed so trivial. The four of us were a team. We were going to have to learn to work together. The better we got along, the better chance we would all have of surviving future dangers. Our lives could depend on our ability to build a trusting friendship.

"No... It's just as much my fault," I said with a weak grin. "But I am willing to put it all behind us."

"That works," Lily replied. "I was also wondering if you would like to stay at my place tonight." I was somewhat stunned. I had never been invited to a sleep over before. Was she taking the first steps in building a friendship with me? If that was the case, it would be in my best interest to accept this strange offer.

"Sure," I said softly. I let Lily pick a song on my computer and we each started our own dance. Or at least she danced, and I just moved around awkwardly. Regardless of my poor dance skills, the world began to blur around us, and I smiled a bit as her house came into view a small ways off. Once we the world settled again, I looked over at Lily.

"You aren't missing much anyway," I said. She looked at me curiously. "Sure, he's cute, but he's kind of an idiot, too." We shared a long laugh together. We were doing our best to enjoy ourselves, in spite of the upsetting events of the afternoon. I tried to believe that together we could make it through anything just fine, but deep inside, I felt a dark powerful fear that nothing was ever going to be the same after this.

To Be Continued...

More author notes: This marks the end of the champion level arc, or the "I accidentally made this arc look a lot like the Wizard of Oz" arc. Seriously, any and all resemblences to the Wizard of Oz were completely coincidental and accidental, except for the title of the last chapter, which is about when I realized what had happened. But the tinman (Omekamon), the lion (Leomon), and the scarecrow (Nohemon) are actually just three of my favorite Digimon who I wanted to use somewhere in my story and fit in this section. And Dorthy and Toto (Lily and Salamon) not being able to find their way home was a last second plot change when I wrote it (I think that's in an author note in chapter four). Weird how those things can happen sometimes.

I hope nobody is really keyed up on reading the discussion that they have the following day, because there's going to be a time skip between this chapter and the next one. Just rest assured that they decide to keep going to the digital world and maybe someone will give a brief recap of what other things were decided in the next chapter.

Art mimics life. The time skip in the gap between these chapters happens to fall near the end of my semester, and so I will also be having a bit of a time skip in that I won't be starting the next chapter until the semester is over. Sorry fans, but school comes first. Gotta get them grades.

Well, see you all again next year. ^_^


End file.
